Getting your club started
Debating can be a fantastic way to really develop students analytical skills and confidence when speaking.
- Five steps for preparing a debate with a class
- Top ten style tips for persuasive speaking
- Questions to ask yourself while debating
- Using an hour to prepare for a debate
- How do I speak for up to five minutes?
- Different forms of rebuttal
- Rebuttal worksheets
- Guidance for chairpersons in a debate
- Note-writing frames for 3-a-side debates
- Note-writing frames for BP (British Parliamentary) debates
Topics
We’ve gathered together a huge number of debating topics over the years. Use one of ours for your club, or peruse our selection to inspire you to create your own. We also have stimulus sheets for lots of topics, which can help novice debaters and less able students feel more confident when preparing for a debate.
Building Skills
These games and exercises are great ways to help develop your students’ debating skills. Use them as a starter activity before diving into a debate, or even devote a whole club session to working on a specific skill.
Debate Videos
Full debates can be a great way to teach the debating format and slowly build your students’ confidence, or you can target their listening skills by getting them to watch and judge one of the debates.
Show one of our games before giving your students a chance to try it out themselves.
Competitions
Debating competitions are a fantastic way for your students to meet other interested (and argumentative) students, develop their confidence and analytical skills, and spend a whole evening or day improving at debating.