IN-CLASSROOM DEBATING:
In-Classroom discussions or debates are of many forms . Some of the techniques described below provide more opportunities to increase students' knowledge of curriculum and engage them in understanding content by increasing their interest.
1:- The Four Corner Debate:
This debate starts with a question or a statement. After that, students are given time to think about the problem or question individually. The four corners of a classrooms are labelled as,
Strongly Agree, Agree, Disagree
and Strongly Disagree.
After thinking about the question or problem, each
student goes to a corner of the classroom depending on their answer.
After that, four groups from four corners of the classroom
present their own strong arguments. After
a group discussion for a certain amount of time, each group presents its
strongest arguments against the other group. This process can be in the form of
a presentation or a discussion. Students may be allowed to change their groups
if they change their opinion after the discussion. By this method conflicting
opinions on an issue can be counted directly. This shows that
there can be more than two different opinions on a
problem.
2:- Role-play debate:
In this discussion model, students play different roles related to a problem. For example, different roles can be assigned to students on the issue of national health protection. For example, a doctor, a patient, a rich person, a poor person, a lawyer, a justice, an insurance company representative, a president and other similar roles. Such a discussion brings out the points of view of different people on a problem. Thus, the students
gain an understanding of vastness and complexity of a
problem.
3:- Fishbowl debate:
This discussion can take many different forms. Chairs are placed for different teams in a circle. Chairs can also be arranged for students who play the role of audience. An empty chair is also placed to give people outside the fishbowl a chance to participate. Any outsider can sit on this chair and become part of the fishbowl to ask a question or argue.
4:- Think-pair Share Debate:
This method requires students to think and make notes individually. After brainstorming individually, pairs of students are formed. The pairs then exchange their notes and list arguments on both sides of the issue. After completing this operation a pair is grouped by another pair. Now groups of four discuss the issue and come up with a list of their best arguments. Finally, each group presents his arguments in front of the congregation class.
5:- Meeting-house debate and Problem-solving debate:
These types of discussion are modified forms of the Lincoln-Douglas debate model. Each team presents an argument in the meeting house. The congregation is then given the opportunity to ask any team a question. The teacher acts as a mediator and ensures that each team gets equal time to present their arguments. To avoid the dominance of just a few students on the discussion and to make participation possible for all students in the class, the teacher provides a card to each student. Each student returns his card after asking the question. With the card back, the student has no opportunity to ask questions. If three cards are given to each student, then after using one card, a student can use another card when
each student should have used one of his cards.
6:- Problem-solving debate:
Usually eight students participate in it. There are four students in each team. A student of each tem presents the argument. The remaining second student gives arguments to prove the argument true or false. Third student presents a problem-solving plan based on the arguments. The remaining two students of each team present a brief summary of the discussion and final arguments on their team's point of view.
Other teaching activities related to discussion can also
be used such as a forum meeting in an open space, a joint task etc.
The main point of a discussion or debate is to give students an opportunity to create high standard critical techniques in themselves rather than having only a basic knowledge of a subject. What is important is that students analyze the knowledge they are acquiring, draw new conclusions and critically evaluate it. Students learn how to apply their course material in practice by reflecting on the best arguments. This knowledge develops oral communication skills in students and enlightens their skills.
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