Mindmade Debatable - A hilarious party game for people who love to argue

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National and international topics persuade children to think globally about the struggles, irrespective of the state or country boundaries. Invite students to share their answers with the class. This debate game can be repeated with any other topic as well. Have four to six student volunteers come to the front of the class. Each one should choose a person that they will play during this game. You may want to restrict them using a theme, e.g. ‘famous people from history’ or ‘characters from Harry Potter. The first finalist should explain why the person to their left does NOT deserve to stay in the balloon. The person criticised in this way should be given a chance to respond before they in turn criticise the person to their left. The person at the end of the line should criticise the person who started the discussion. Students in the outer circle take notes about points those students bring up; notes are used in a follow-up classroom discussion and/or for writing an editorial opinion expressing a point of view on the issue at hand.

Round 2: Dish the Dirt – possible search terms for students to use when using the web to research negative points about the rival finalists!

The beauty of these kinds of debate games lies in the realisation that we’re entirely in control of where the argument goes and what we’re going to say next. We always know what the other side is going to reply to. As Mill’s Trident suggests, in an argument, we can only be wrong, partially correct or 100% accurate. But at this point, nobody is even contradicting us, let alone attempting to refute our arguments. So in a way, we can only defeat ourselves. Speed Debating capitalises on people’s preference to just have a go at each other verbally. In my experience, the rules of engagement in a formalised debate are what puts many people off. In this debate game, pretty much the only rule is to engage. (Which of course we can do most effectively if we’ve mastered If I ruled the world… and the Why Game). But let’s be honest, there’s a reason why Hitchens is famous for the Hitchslap, not the Hitch-Rules-of-Engagement. Divide the students into small groups, and give each pair of groups a ‘neutral’ statement (e.g. ‘London is a big city’, or ‘Birds can fly’). Ask one team in each pair to present the statement to the group so it sounds good (‘London is a big, multicultural, thriving city’), and the other to present it so it sounds bad (‘London is a big, dangerous, noisy city’). 5) Stranded on a Desert Island

Apart from knowing how to run the activities and what we can achieve with them, there’s one last point to consider. The eternal trade-off between content and delivery. Depending on the group and context, the mere goal of improving reasoning or communication skills may not capture the undivided attention of the whole group. We may need the right content or context as motivational drivers.

Engage children with digital learning

If we were to completely nerd out, we could even record the game, get a transcript and analyse which rabbit holes debaters chose and where they could’ve taken a different route. We could then repeat the game to see how we improved. Since every issue can be broken down into subtopics and corresponding arguments, it can be a great brainstorming exercise to map out this territory. It’s a cruder, more applied method than systematic research; a method that makes us reconsider what we know about an issue and how much we’ve actually thought it through. Divide the class into three groups. Select two groups to participate in the debate. The third group acts as an observer.

The ‘Two hands / One hand” voting system works well here: in this format, students raise two hands (=two votes against) their least favourite character, and one hand against the second least-favoured. This makes for a slightly more sophisticated voting outcome. In the first lesson, each student needs to choose (or will be allocated) a character relating to the topic of study (for example, eminent Victorians). Round 2 – Each proposal may be best at something, but this doesn’t yet allow us to choose which is best overall. At any rate, I’d like to think that I invented this version, even though I’m sure someone beat me to it. The way I like to do it is to have all participants sit at a long table, two people facing each other (even numbers work best or someone has to pause). It’s a setup we find in speed dating (I guess) or at chess tournaments.Obviously, it doesn’t have to be the world. We can start small with a continent, a country, our company or school, department, or team. Sounds too easy? It is. As long as we’re all absolutely sure we can stand up straight in front of a group, introduce ourselves and take a clear position on an issue; regardless of what the crowd may reply let alone think of us. It’s a bit of a silly practice of course. This is one of the debate games that encourages us to justify ourselves until we run out of sensible things to say by running into the so-called Münchhausen Trilemma. From my experience, people usually start by giving thoughtful and complex explanations until they feel the pressure mounting. Soon they’re forced into nitty-gritty terrain where they simply run out of things to say. They grow more and more defensive by the mere fact of having to justify themselves until their mind shuts down. Even though the rules don’t say, you have to reply in a heartbeat. Conscious Choices Have someone discuss 2-3 arguments about any simple prompt (i.e. “Spring is better than summer.”). Listeners take notes using as few full, real words as possible -- the goal is to try use abbreviations, symbols, and codes to represent ideas. When each group has a winner, you can have a further round in front of the class to find an overall winning object. 8) Balloon Debate