Adolescents often disregard many controversial issues, but the Great Debate gave the students of team 8B the chance to research and sympathize for actions and events that affect numerous people in a hands-on way. It took an in depth look at a broad variety of topics from gun control to stem cell research and put each individual student “in the driver’s seat” so to speak.
What I enjoyed about the debate was the equal workload of each group member. All three of our group members had to research with note cards, draft a speech and either ask and answer rebuttal questions or recite a conclusion; which applied to all groups pro or con. Although I believed that only using one portion of the cards and giving the rest to the opposing group, I enjoyed learning about both sides of the topic to prepare for any of the topics brought up by our opponents. I would have never thought twice about the gun control situation and how it affects American’s in their everyday lives, but now I do. I can take my knowledge gained from this experience and apply it to life. Not only did I gain information about the topic I had to research, but by there being audience participation during the debates, I know about many controversial issues, not just one. The audience and teachers filling out evaluations for every debate was also an aspect that I enjoyed. I felt that putting much emphasis on the debate encouraged me to work better. For example, the debate was being counted as part of both the Reading and Language Arts grade, which made my conduct and work ethic even better knowing that two class grade would suffer if my performance was inadequate.
With the throngs of aspects of the debate that enjoyed, there were some areas where I though there could be improvement. During the opening speeches, many vital portions were not incorporated due to the short 1:15 time limitations. I found myself and others reading too fast and unclearly to compensate for the excessive, and in some cases, prodigal time. I also was confused by the rebuttal answers being irrelevant and not relative to the question itself. Although there were groups such as gun control, they were separated in two groups, pro and con, but all members of the group gave their pro side not cards to the pro and their con side cards to the con side depending on which side they were on. Instead of this, I thought it would be more efficient to decide which group would be pro and con in the beginning to cut down on wasteful and unnecessary work.