During the second week of November, from the 11th to the 15th, the year 11 students of Dubai Scholars took part in an engaging and enthusiastic debate held by the English department. The classes were divided into teams of three, and each team had their own individual topics. Depending upon the class schedules of each section, it was decided that a few lucky teams would have an interclass debate if their English lessons shared the same timings.
The topics for the debate are as follows;
Should death penalty have a place in the modern world?
Should we trust banks?
Is it appropriate for governments to restrict freedom of speech?
should parents be required to attend parenting classes before having a child?
Plastic surgery for children, should it be banned?
Children should have the right to sue their parents for physical and mental trauma upon reaching the age of maturity.
Should students grade the quality of teachers?
Beauty pageants: Are they a way to objectify women?
During the debate, the classes were divided into three sections, the proposition team on one end, the opposition team on the other and at the back were the research tables. The proposition team were those who were speaking for the topic, the opposition, against and the research tables were the other groups of the class who would spend their time during the debate working on their material for their upcoming debates.
Each team was given a time limit for their respective speeches. The introduction to the debate topic was for a minute and a half. The opening speeches of both, the proposition and the opposition speeches were given a minute and a half to speak on their topic. Then the first speaker of each team got three minutes to portray their side of the story, after which a break of two minutes were given to the teams to get ready for the next round. As soon as the break got over, the opposition team went on to state their counter argument for three minutes followed by a break for another three minutes giving enough time for the opposition to prepare their two minute rebuttal. They narrowed down to the end of the debate giving the teams a minute each to conclude with their closing statements.
As per the judging of the debate, there was a slight catch to it. This time the teachers weren’t the judges, in fact, the jury consisted of fellow peers witnessing the debate! This was a great change for most students as it gave them an exposure to a hand on experience on judging a debate. Most students mentioned that the debate was a great experience for them. The topics assigned were quite controversial and were serious matters faced by the world, and having to speak about these topics really brought the students out of their comfort zone and urged them to have a say in it. The debate was quite the journey and it did put a lot of different skills to test, helping our students become better than they already are. We hope to have more debates like this.
Written by-Alicia Kunte 10B Composed by- Murtaza Barkarar 10B