By Richard Gresswell from ELTbites
This is just one way to set up and manage a class debate on a topic of your choice. You can also use it as lead-in to writing for/against essays.
First of all, decide on your topic, as an example here I am using ‘private transport vs public transport.- Next, ask students if they prefer to use ‘private’ or ‘public’ transport in general based on answers split class into two groups but try to create similar size groups.
- Then, each group brainstorms as many ideas to defend why public or private transport is better, one person in each group is nominated to write down group ideas, give students 10 – 15 minutes for this.
- After that, call class together, nominate one person from one group to read out one of their suggestions, nominate someone from other group to attack, repeat this process with ideas from learners lists (you can chair or ask a student to chair the debate), you could monitor and record language that comes out of the debate and then put on board afterwards.
- Later, you could use a simple debate like this in order to generate ideas for a ‘for and against essay’ perhaps as part of an exam class.
