Prof.Barbacaru Irina Cătălina
Colegiul Tehnic PETRU PONI
ROMAN
‘This is an organized form of competitive
speaking, an event in which two sides -two teams - use reasoned discourse to
argue about a particular subject. The goal of each team is to convince an
audience that its arguments are better than those of the opposition. With
debates, the emphasis is on logic; but students may also use appeals and
arguments that carry emotional weight.Debates require high language
proficiency, therefore the activity is generally recommended for advanced
learners.’[1]
The debate is organized around a motion (or proposition),
generally in the form of a declarative sentence, which functions as the
title (or topic) of the debate. As a form of organization it requires
two teams holding opposing opinions: an affirmative team (whose task is to
defend the idea) and a negative team (whose task is to oppose the idea). The
team members mustn’t believe in the cause they support, they only have to learn
strategic skills in a debate.
Scott Thornbury presents in his book three
types of debates: Balloon Debate, Pyramid Debate and Panel Discussions.[2]
Balloon
Debate is a popular format based on the idea that a
hot-air balloon with its cargo of passengers is dangerously overloaded and at
least one of the passengers has to be jettisoned. The group members,
representing famous people in history, famous living people, or people in
different professions, put their case as to why they should be saved and why
someone else should be sacrificed. This works best if students have had time to
prepare their case, and this can be done in pairs. And if there are enough
students to form two balloons, matched pairs from each balloon first work
together, before re-forming in order to stage the debate.
Pyramid
Debate; the principle of this format is that at first
individuals work in pairs to achieve consensus on an issue, and then these
pairs try to convince other pairs, before forming groups of four, and so on,
until the whole class comes to an agreement. For example, the teacher might set
the class the task of devising some class’ rules with regard to such things
classroom etiquette, discipline, duties, homework, etc. First, individuals
draft a list of a maximum of eight rules. They then compare in pairs, and draft
a new list of eight rules, that they are both agreed on. This will normally
involve some discussion and negotiation. Once they have their list, they join
forces with another pair, and the process begins again. Finally, the two halves
of the class come together to agree on the definitive version. We can also use
in this kind of debate topics about the five most important people in history,
the ten best songs of the 80’s, the six school subjects that should be
compulsory in high schools, and so on.
Panel
Discussions adopt the format of a television debate in
which people representing various shades of oppinion on a topic argue the case,
usually under the guidance of a chairperson. One way of organizing this is to
let students first work in pairs to marshal their arguments, then one of each
pair takes their place on the panel, while the others form the audience – who
can, of course, ask questions once the panel list have stated their point of
view. This method can be related to role-play if we give the students clearly
defined roles (psychologist, social worker, teacher, police officer, etc). And,
of course, discussions will work much better if students have useful phrases
with them or they can make posters and held them around the room to be seen.
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