I got to do a debate in my ELA class, and it was so much fun! In a Great Debate, there are either 5 or 6 people in a group, and each person has a specific role in the debate. The roles we had were constructor, topic presenter, rebutter, questioner, responder, and the summarizer. I had 6 people in my group, and I got to be the rebutter for our team. The prompt for our debate was “Should more tough gun control laws be passed?” Thankfully, my team was on the pro side, we got to say why it’s a good idea to pass more gun control laws. I came up with 8 rebuttals based on things I read in the article we were given. I ended up needing only 3 of them. On Monday through Wednesday, my group and I prepared all of the parts of our debate. We helped each other as well to prepare. I wrote my part, and then I also wrote the summarizer’s part.
On Thursday, we had our debate. Both constructors gave their opening statements. And then both topic presenters gave their reasons to back up their claim. Then our teacher gave us a 2-minute break to discuss with our team what the rebutter was going to say. I already knew what I was going to say, but I still ran through it with my group. They all agreed with the rebuttals I came up with. I used 3 from my list that I had made the night before. After the rebutters had a back and forth rebuttal, the questioners and the responders got to talk. It went back and forth twice, and then summarizer would close. When our responder was responding to a question, he couldn’t find where he had written it down, so I told him to go to my doc, ’cause I had the answer to the question on it. He answered it correctly and it all worked out. Our summarizer wasn’t ready and didn’t want to present, so I presented for her because I had already written a part for that. My group said I should do it and I didn’t mind.
The rest of our class was grading us on a score sheet. Most people told me they gave me 4/4. I was happy that my classmates thought I did a good job. And the next day I got to grade the other groups. Our whole Great Debate was a lot of fun, I learned a lot, and it was a good experience.
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