Free Debate Inc.

Free Debate fosters free and fair debate in

society with a focus on helping the under-
privileged, the under-represented and the under-
prepared.

Free Debate operates on an apolitical, non-

religious and non-profit basis.

Free Debate seeks to promote public debates as

a means of encouraging informed civic
participation.

Free Debate provides debate-related consulting,

coaching and facilitation services to needy
individuals and organisations, including schools,
charities, non-government organisations,
community groups, local government and
business.

Teacher’s Guide

A0047104R
ABN 13 496 482 286
Who we are.
• We are a volunteer based, non-profit organisation
• Our members are people who have had substantial experience in public speaking and
debating competitions and/or training debating teams
• Our members come from a diverse range of backgrounds

Our aims are.

• To foster free and fair debate in society with a focus on helping the under-privileged, the
under-represented and the under-prepared.
• To operate on an apolitical, non-religious and non-profit basis.
• To provide debate-related consulting, coaching and facilitation services to needy individuals
and organisations, including schools, charities, non-government organisations, community
groups, local government and business.
• To promote public debates as a means of encouraging informed civic participation.
• To generate and distribute debate-related resources and reference materials.
• To assist and co-operate with other organisations, especially recognised debating
organisations, with a view to providing complementary services.

What we do.
• We provide training in debating and public speaking to people from a range of backgrounds
and ages
• We do this through working with various partner organisations to deliver training programs,
including:
o Western Chances
o Victorian Arabic Social Services
o Adult Multicultural Education Service
o Asylum Seeker Resource Centre

Why we do it.
Empowerment
• Advocacy skills are incredibly important for many day-to-day situations, such as job
interviews, interactions with Centrelink, health services and other government agencies
• Many people in our community never receive training on how to communicate their point of
view clearly and with confidence, and often feel unable to speak up
Leadership
• In the groups we most often work with, confident leaders are in demand to advocate for and
tackle existing socioeconomic challenges within their community
• Free Debate Inc seeks to help by teaching argument-based critical thinking as well as
effective, confident communication

More.
• Email: freedebate@gmail.com
• http://www.freedebate.org.au/

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WHAT TO TEACH COMMENTARY
The Three Rules of Public Speaking/Debating This introduction does
a number of things – it
1. The Snake Rule emphasises the value
• Surveys suggest that people are more afraid of public and power of public
speaking than of snakes! speaking, helps to
• Almost everyone finds public speaking scary – whether it foster empathy
is standing up in front of the class, giving a presentation at between everyone in
work or uni, presenting yourself in a job interview or the room, and sets the
advocating for something you believe in. [insert personal most important ground
story of your own experience with scary speaking] rules about the content
• But here’s the point - what this means is that anyone who of speeches.
is brave enough to take on public speaking and can do
even an average job at it has a huge advantage.

2. The Scary Audience Rule

• It is easy to think that your audience – the people looking
at you when you speak – want you to fail; that they are
just waiting for you to stuff up so they can laugh.
• Actually, that’s almost never true – your audience wants
you to succeed.
• Why? Because there is only one thing worse than giving a
very bad speech, and that is watching a very bad speech –
if you have any kind of human feeling, watching someone
who is giving a terrible, nervous speech makes you feel
bad and embarrassed for them, which is horrible!
• What this all means is that your audience wants you to do
well – they want to see you walk up to the stage or the
front of the class confidently and reassure them that they
are in safe hands and can relax.

3. The Spiderman Rule

• This is the most important rule of all – when you learn to
be a good public speaker you are learning how to have
power.
• You are learning how to persuade people of things, to
convince them to believe or do things they might not have
done if they hadn’t listened to you.
• So the Spiderman Rule applies – “with great power comes
great responsibility”. I am not training you to be able to
give a great speech so that you can convince people of
things that are racist, or sexist, or homophobic, or may
hurt them or others.

Ground rules for the session(s) It is critical that every-

one in the class speaks

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So, today everyone is going to speak. No exceptions. the first time you teach
• Public speaking is a skill, like kicking a soccer ball or public speaking, and
playing a guitar. The more you do it, the better you get at that everyone gets
it. specific, tailored praise.
• Each of us is going to discover the individual things that Praise is the single
we do that show other people that we are nervous, or that most effective way to
tell other people we are confident. keep people engaged
and improving.
• Each of us is going to figure out how to make sure that The imperative of
people remember the things we say and to make sure the speaking actually
things we say are worth remembering. reduces anxiety, and
• And we are going to help each other get better – we are ensures that students’
going to give each other positive, helpful feedback. Start feedback is moderated
with something positive, and then something that the by the expectation that
speaker could focus on to improve. Remember, everyone they too will be
is going to speak, so you will be both getting feedback and speaking.
giving it.
“The Three Cs” This is the more
accessible equivalent
1. Confidence of the categories used
2. Clarity in debating, i.e.
3. Content “manner, method and
matter”. We suggest
that you introduce one
per lesson, to limit
information overload
and maximise the time
for students to practice,
focussing on
confidence, then clarity,
then content, in turn.
Confidence These exercises really
wake everyone up!
1. Exercises to Get Started (Voice exercises)
• Exercise: Get the group to all stand up. Count from 1-10, Key elements of vocal
where 1 is the quietest possible and 10 is the loudest style include:
possible. After counting as a group, count around a circle Volume
or similar, where each person must be louder to the next. Speed/Pace
Pitch/Tone
• Exercise: Projecting your voice. Speaking in public Enunciation/
sometimes requires you to speak more loudly than normal. Pronunciation
Everyone should place their hands on their stomach and Pauses
breathe in so that your hands get pushed outwards. Now
make ‘tss’ sounds. Now make ‘ha ha ha’ sounds. As loud
as possible. Feel the volume you can make!

2. What is confidence in public speaking?

• What does it feel like? It is easy to think that confidence is
a deep down feeling that you are going to be perfect. In
fact, confidence is just as much an act, a performance,
as a feeling.
• It is a terrible mistake to think that if you are nervous
before you speak you won’t be any good. Lots of great
speakers and actors still feel incredibly nervous before

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 they get on the stage. What makes them different is that
they do it anyway. [insert personal story about your own
nervousness before speaking]
• When you look out at an audience or an interview panel, it
is only your mum who cares whether you are nervous.
What they care about is whether you look nervous, and
whether your nervousness stops you from speaking well.
• So, our motto is – fake it until you make it!
• Interactive: Some experts suggest that more than 50% of Generally, for
all communication occurs through body language. We all nervousness,
have “tells”, things that give away to other people how we participants come up
are really feeling. What do you do when you are nervous? with shaking hands,
[have prepared what you do when you’re nervous, to speaking too softly or
share ] too fast, crossing arms,
• Interactive: What do you do when you are feeling reading their speech,
confident? twirling their hair, or
avoiding eye contact.
3. Elements of Confident Speaking
• Key elements of body language include For confidence, they
• Eye Contact will come up with eye
• Hand Position & Gesture contact, speaking at the
right volume and pace,
• Stance & Posture
natural gestures and
• Appearance
movement, and smiling.
• Key elements of vocal style include: When explaining what
• Volume the various elements of
• Speed/Pace confident speaking are,
• Pitch/Tone it can be fun to
• Enunciation/ Pronunciation demonstrate the full
• And Pauses... range of options – from
low to hi, fast to slow,
• Sometimes just as important as what you say and how you extreme eye contact
say it is when you pause – when you are silent. [Pause etc..
until everyone is paying attention] How many people were This highlights the
tuned out just then? How many people have tuned out at comfortable range
some point in this presentation? which speakers should
fall into.
4. Being Yourself [this is additional and you may wish to
include it]
• Everyone has something about the way they communicate
with other people that is attractive – maybe you are down
to earth, or funny, or warm and friendly, or enthusiastic, or
very clear and precise, or you have natural authority, or
you are someone people feel they can trust.
• The trick is to figure out what those things are and bring
them out in your public speaking.
The rationale behind
5. Additional Exercises and Games this set of exercises is
• Exercise: Speech Reading. Give all members of the class to remove the need to
a short excerpt from a famous speech and ten to fifteen focus on Content and
minutes to practice reading it out loud. Students then read Clarity, and leave the
the speech in front of the class, and have the rest of the students free to focus
group offer positive comments along with constructive on their Confidence –
much like acting!

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 criticism.
• Exercise: Mystery Argument. Create a set of flash cards For Mystery Argument,
with typed out arguments. Students will choose one from it can be useful to use
the pack, get a minute to read over, then present with excerpts from opinion
appropriate style. pieces, that cover a
wide range of subject
matter and emotions

• Game: Pirate’s Funeral. Create two sets of cards, one

with emotions and one with characters/professions.
Students take turns to pick one of each card and then
speak in front of the class. Without saying who they are or
what their emotion is, they must try and act out their
character and emotion. Rest of class calls out guesses,
just as in charades.
• Exercise: Watch Youtube clips of famous politicians and The eye contact drill
inspirational figures speaking. What are some of the should be difficult for
things that they do? With their eyes? With their hands? both participants – the
With their voice? key message is that (at
• Exercise: Hand gestures in normal conversation. Partner least in Western
up and have a quick chat. Note what the other person culture) eye contact is
does with their hands in normal conversation. necessary both to keep
• Exercise: Eye contact drill. Partner up and turn to face listener engaged and to
each other, knee to knee. Person A talks about their make it feel more
weekend while deliberately looking away from Person B. natural for the speaker.

Clarity If your students aren’t

really following, you
1. What is Clarity? can draw the analogy
• Clarity is about presenting what you say in a logical and to what it would be like
ordered way. This is important, because it will make it if you started teaching
easy for people to remember what you have said. one subject then
• It sounds really simple, but it is easy to forget. jumped back and
forward to other
2. How do we make things clearer when speaking? subjects, or started
a. Structure teaching without telling
• A speech should have a logical structure, just like writing then which subject you
an essay. For example, if you have two main points to were doing so they
make in your speech, it is good if you finish the first one didn’t know what books
before you move onto the second one. What people often to get out.
do, though, is jump backwards and forwards to different
points – which is very hard for your audience to follow and
understand.
• One way of telling whether you have a good structure in
your speech is to write it out in separate paragraphs – a While there are some
paragraph for the introduction, the first point, the second activities and games
point etc, and the conclusion. that emphasise
b. Signposting signposting, one of the
• Signposting is about letting people know where you are best ways to reinforce
going. It’s phrases like: signposting and
- My second point isJ structure once students
- In conclusionJ have already spoken
• Sometimes people talk about signposting and “Rule of once is to get them to
Three” repeat their speech

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 - Say what you’re going to say with appropriate
- Say it signposting. If they are
- Say what you just said! confident enough, you
could even interrupt
3. Exercises and Games them as they are
• Interactive: Ask the class to brainstorm some phrases that speaking and get them
you can use to tell people where you are at in your to signpost when they
speech. have missed this out.
• Demonstration: Present a highly disorganised/unordered
speech with three key points. See how many students can
remember all three. Now do another speech using a clear
structure and signposting, and see how many can
remember all three points.
• Exercise: Tell us three things about your weekend in a
highly structured way.

Content This is the most difficult

• While what most people worry about when they have to do of the Three Cs to
public speaking is confidence, what they actually should teach – it’s essentially
be worried about is content – that is, how good the points critical thinking, which
are that they are going to make! all the research
• There are lots of different ways to convince people of evidence suggests
things - including telling stories about your experience or takes real effort to
the experience of others, or giving arguments, or using improve. Debating has
force. Using force is likely to get you arrested. But what the potential to make
about telling stories? In the right circumstance, sharing a three contributions to
powerful experience can be incredibly effective in getting improving critical
people to see things differently. thinking. It trains
• But there are two problems with this approach – it relies on people in the
construction (and
people trusting that you are telling the truth about what has
happened to you or to someone else. If the people you deconstruction) of
are speaking to know and trust you, this works fine. But if arguments. The
you are speaking to an audience who don’t know you, this second is that it
may not work. The second problem is that just because introduces them to a
you experienced something in a certain way, it doesn’t wide variety of actual
mean that most people did. It is easy to attack a story by arguments being made
telling another story where my experience differed from in the world, which
yours. Then who is right? makes the idea of
• For this reason, unless a story is well known and used as critically engaging with
an example to support an argument, it can be risky to rely those arguments more
on a story to make your point. [if doing debating training, familiar and natural.
note that personal examples shouldn’t be used] Finally, by requiring
people to speak on a
1. Argument Construction side of the debate they
a. Assertion versus argument may not agree with, it
• When researchers went out and tried to get people to give may encourage one of
arguments, they found something interesting. Most people the main preconditions
just repeated their assertion in different words – they for critical thinking –
couldn’t give an argument. “active open
• So, what is an assertion? It is a statement – such as mindedness”.
“Melbourne is the best city in the world”, or “Collingwood
deserve to win ten premierships”, or “You should vote for The parts of an
the Greens”. argument
• Interactive: Ask the group: what do you think is the -Contention/ Assertion

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 difference between an assertion and an argument? (aka the
[should come up with “reasons”, “evidence” and so on – conclusion/main point)
objective is to build up the parts of an argument, as set out -Reasons/ Premises
in column two of this document. This can then be applied -Evidence to support
to one of the assertions mentioned above – e.g. those reasons,
Melbourne is the best city in the world, because it has (1) including statistics and
great sporting events such as... (2) great cultural events examples
such as.... etc]
b. Credible evidence Rather than providing
• There are lots of good sources evidence – the news and your students with a list
newspapers, things you learn at school, reports from of credible sources of
different credible organisations (e.g. CSIRO, UN), credible evidence, you could
books etc ask them to find five
• Of course, you can come up with your own reasons! credible sources and
(although you will need to check to see if there is any five suspect sources.
evidence to support your reason!) You could then have a
c. Making the links discussion about what
• The difficult bit is actually making sure that you to look for in a source
explain enough – that you spell out the reasons and of evidence.
evidence, and their relevance to the statement.
d. Rebuttal
• Sometimes when you give an argumentative speech you
will need to deal with arguments from others who disagree Almost all students (of
with you. This is always true in debating. any age) struggle with
• Dealing with those arguments is called “rebuttal”. rebuttal. It is, like
Basically it’s showing why the arguments of your everything else in
opponents are not valid or not as good as yours. public speaking and
• The key thing to remember is that your rebuttal has to be debating, a matter of
consistent with your own argument. It is like your preparation (it is
argument is a fortress and your rebuttal is shooting arrows possible to anticipate
at your enemy arguments. You have to shoot the arrows most of the arguments
from within the fortress to win. the other side are going
• Example: if I argue that Melbourne is the best city in the to use) and practice.
world because, among other things, it has great food, and The good news is that if
my opponent argues Sydney has better food, I can’t defeat you can explain your
that argument by saying the quality of food in a city doesn’t own arguments clearly,
matter. Why? Because it would defeat my own argument rebuttal becomes a lot
as well as my opponent’s. easier. This is because
rebuttal is always
Points of attack [may wish to include if coaching debating] grounded in the
perspective sitting
• People often rebut an argument by attacking the
under your own
examples. This is the weakest point of attack, because
arguments.
your opponent can always slot in another example and the
rest of the argument stands. From strongest to weakest,
the points of attack are:
i. Relevance of premises to assertion/conclusion – i.e. it may
be true that Melbourne has the best food, but this is
not the way you judge a great city. What is important
isJ
ii. Truth of the premises – i.e. in fact Melbourne doesn’t have
the top cultural events in the world. London, New
York, Paris and Berlin all have greater collections of
art, higher quality theatre and music eventsJ
iii. Key facts – e.g. statistics being inaccurate or outdated.

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 iv. Weight of the argument – even if this argument is relevant
and true, on balance it is outweighed by other points
(e.g. the food is the best in Melbourne, but this is
outweighed by public transport problems).
v. Examples – as discussed above. The only reason to
spend any significant time attacking an example is if
the other side spent a lot of time building it up (i.e. it is
an important / featured part of their case).
e. Exercises and Games A part of the value of
• Preparation for a speech! Probably the most valuable debating is that it
way to draw out assertions into arguments is to work in a focuses the mind on
small group setting, where members are asked to present constructing the best
a speech on something they think should happen (e.g. arguments – in a way
something they think the school should change). Try to that any other activity
work with each student on finding reasons to support their that doesn’t involve
assertions and turn them into arguments. This process can public competition may
be painstaking and will need to be repeated before find difficult to achieve!
students are able to do it on their own. It is a big part of
what good debating coaches facilitate in their training
(without simply giving students the arguments).
• Exercise: ask students to generate assertions that they
believe to be true and think about the reasons and any
evidence for that assertion. Then get into small groups.
Each student states their assertion, and tries to answer
five rounds of “why?” questions from the other group
members. You could go first in front of the group to model
the approach, maybe using a humorous contention (like
the one about Collingwood!).
• Homework: Give each of your students a different
assertion to take home, and get them to compile the best
evidence they can find to support this assertion. In the
next session, get them to explain in front of the group what In the rebuttal chain
their assertion was, and what evidence they found to drill, it is important to
support it. emphasise the use of
• Exercise: Rebuttal Chain. Present an argument. Nominate evidence as a means of
a student to criticise the argument in the format ‘The last supporting rebuttal.
speaker said x, this is not correct because y’. Then
nominate another student to attack the statement that was
just made. Continue on until all students have spoken.

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Putting it all together in a classroom-friendly debate:

OXFORD STYLE DEBATES

What is an Oxford style debate?

• A style of debate that involves two teams, an Affirmative and a Negative.
• It can be more easily though of as a ‘line’ debate.
• The first Affirmative speaker starts the debate, and the final Negative speaker
concludes the debate.
• It differs from traditional styles of school debating in that each team may have at least
four members.
• Speeches can be varied in length depending on the experience levels of the
speakers involved.

An example of the flow of an Oxford debate:

AFFIRMATIVE NEGATIVE

1st 1st

2nd 2nd

3rd 3rd

4th 4th

How should teams prepare?

• The Affirmative and Negative teams should prepare their speeches as separate
teams.
• It is suggested that teams follow the basic structure of a preparation i.e. individual
brain storm, discussion, division of arguments, writing of arguments.
• Often it is necessary to prioritise the speeches of the first few speakers because they
have the least amount of time to prepare.
• The most important arguments should be advanced by the first few speakers in order
to maximise their effect.

What should speakers discuss?

• The roles of each speaker vary, however broadly speaking most speakers are
required to advance an argument for their side of the debate and rebut the speaker
that came directly before them in the debate.
• There are of course exceptions i.e. the first Affirmative cannot rebut because they are
the first speaker!

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The table below sets out speaker roles.

AFFIRMATIVE NEGATIVE
1st
1st
• Clarify the Negative position i.e.,
• Define the topic does the team agree with the
• Identify the problem that the topic definition, problem and/or
is based on solution?
• Propose a solution to address this • Rebut the 1st Affirmative’s
problem argument
• Advance an argument to support • Advance an argument to support
the proposition
the opposition
2nd 2nd

• Rebut the 1st Negative’s • Rebut the 2nd Affirmative’s

argument argument
• Advance an argument to support • Advance an argument to support
the proposition the opposition
3rd 3rd

• Rebut the 2nd Negative’s • Rebut the 3rd Affirmative’s

argument
• Advance an argument to support
the proposition
4th
• Rebut the key themes from all of
the Affirmative speeches
• Summarise the debate
argument
• Advance an argument to support
the opposition
4th
• Rebut the key themes from all of
the Affirmative speeches
• Summarise the debate

Tips?
• Given Oxford debates involve large numbers of people on each team, particular
attention should be made to encourage all members to participate constructively to
the debate.
• It is also important to maintain an ordered debate to allow all speakers to maximise
their participation.
• For time limits, two or three minutes is a good start depending on the age of the
participants. Often students will not speak for this length of time on their first attempt.

Suggested Topics:
• School related
• That we should ban school uniforms
• That all education should be co-educational
• That teachers should receive performance pay
• That we should abolish selective schools
• General
• That we should ban zoos
• That we should abolish the monarchy
• That we should lower the voting age
• That we should ban poker machines

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Where to from here?
1. Starting or expanding on a debating program at your school
The Debaters Association of Victoria (DAV) runs several debating competitions for schools:
• The DAV Schools Competition is for students from Years 9 to 12, and debates are
held at twenty regions in Melbourne and across Victoria (including Geelong, Ballarat
and Bendigo).
• The Junior Secondary Program is for students in Years 7 and 8, and includes training
as well as the competitive debates.
• There are several Regional Debating competitions, which also include training days.
This year competitions were held in the Wimmera (Horsham), Gippsland (Sale),
Murray (Echuca), Goulburn (Shepparton), Western District (Hamilton / Warrnambool),
Border (Wodonga) and Mallee (Mildura) regions.
• Coaching and entering a team of students is a great project you could take on
during your time with TFA.
• The costs of entry to these competitions vary, but if cost is likely to prevent your
school from entering you can contact the DAV who can negotiate a fee waiver or
discount.
• Entering a team of students into the DAV competition is a fantastic way to
promote confident speaking and informed engagement with world issues over
a longer time frame with the students who are involved. This is likely to make a
difference in your students’ schoolwork, tertiary education, future
employability and leadership potential.

2. Support for building a debating program at your school

• Free Debate Inc. can provide a range of different support services if you want to start
and/or build on a debating program at your school.
• We can provide you with a starter pack of materials and services to get you
going.
• We can come to your school and provide introductory training for the students.
• We can come to your school and train you and other teachers on how to coach and
manage a debating team.
• We can provide advice and assistance with the logistics of setting up a debating
program at your school, such as which competitions to enter, how many students you
will need in your team/s, how often they should train etc.
• We can provide you with ongoing support.
• We can assign a Free Debate Inc. trainer to provide support to your via phone or
email to answer any questions you may have, provide suggestions for training
material etc.

• We can be contacted easily.

• Email: freedebate@gmail.com

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