Purpose: to Gain Experience in the Area of Debate Formats

Team Debates

Purpose: To gain experience in the area of debate formats.

Grading: 100 points total for each side

Time limits: Strict time limits will be adhered to within each round of debates. A team that is over the time limit will be severely penalized.

Instructions: Each team will consist of four members. Two members will represent the affirmative and two will represent the negative. The team must choose a claim from the instructor and this claim must be a proposition of policy. After this is done the team should decide who will take the affirmative and who will take the negative for each claim. Each pair should then divide from the other side and start planning their research. Listed below is the debate format:

Affirmative Constructive: 4 minutes

Cross-examination from by negative: 3 minutes

Negative Constructive: 4 minutes

Cross- Examination by affirmative: 3 minutes

Affirmative Rebuttal: 3 minutes

Negative Rebuttal: 3 minutes

Total time – 20 minutes

Speaking Responsibilities:

Constructive Speeches: The affirmative constructive speech presents and outline of the entire affirmative case. This includes all arguments your team plans on using within the debate. This outline should usually include identification of specific reasons, definitions, benefits and visualization for the affirmative side.

The negative construction speech serves two purposes. First, it presents the negative position, and secondly attacks the affirmative position. The negative side may challenge the definitions and other criteria presented by the affirmative. Provide good reasons why the proposition is not true.

Cross examinations: Both the affirmative and the negative should construct a series of questions which 1)clarify a previous statement of the witness, 2)commit the other side to a particular position or issue, 3)refute the validity of a previous statement 4) undermine the credibility of the respondents. You should never ask a question to which you do not know the answer! Rebuttal: Both the affirmative and the negative should be prepared to deliver counter-arguments refuting the other side’s position. Careful concerns should be given to the five step method of refutation:

a) State the point you will refute and explain its importance to the opposing position

b) Tell how you will refute the point

c) Present evidence to refute the point

d) Show how the evidence refutes the point

e) Explain the significance of the refutation

Evaluation: After each team is done with your debate plan on filling out a short evaluation of each other’s participation and involvement with the assignment. This should be done in a constructive way. Be honest with how you evaluate each other. All evaluations will be done anonymously.

Bibliography: After your debate, turn in to me a bibliography page containing all sources you used during the debate. Make sure all citations are in MLA or APA format. A minimum of 5 sources are required for this assignment.