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SIXTO G. RAMOS
High School Social Studies Teacher (Colegio Roosevelt)
(Psychology, Economics, Philosophy-Logic, and Debate)

FORMAL DEBATE

INTRODUCTION

OBJECTIVES

TRAINING

WORKSHOPS

COMPETITIONS

DEBATE IN PERU

IN THE WORLD

DEBATE COURSE

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FORMAL DEBATE AT COLEGIO ROOSEVELT

INTRODUCTION

Debate is a new academic activity in Colegio Roosevelt. It started in 1992 when I had the opportunity to found the DEBATE CLUB. Since then up to now many students have become involved in this fascinating and challenging work. All of them receive training in the debating techniques through workshops, public debates, and the course of debate. Many students have attended international competitions such as forensics (Brazil, Bolivia, and Peru), debating competitions (Argentina), and world debating championships in Canada Bermuda, Israel, England, United States, and South Africa.

OBJECTIVES OF DEBATE

The purpose of debate is to help students to:

look at issues from different angles
question assumptions
research facts
develop logical arguments that will persuade others
teach them to think more critically about the world around them
organize their thoughts and present them clearly, efficiently, and persuasively
defend their points of view
be updated about current events
be confident, and
work with discipline

DEBATE TRAINING

The training in debate takes place in several ways in the club as well as in the debate course. Students practice:

library and internet research
oral presentations on current events
article writings regarding controversial topics
public speeches, on assigned topics
debate competitions: internal (for everybody), public (experienced debaters), inter school (everybody), international (selected debaters)
workshops
readings
debate analysis (videos)
group discussions

INTERNATIONAL DEBATE COMPETITIONS

Roosevelt students have been participating in different international competitions such as ,Forensics (Brazil 1994, Bolivia 1995, Lima 1996), Debating and Public Speaking Tournaments (Argentina 1997, 1998, and 2000), and, over all, in World Schools Debating Championships: Meicine Hat (Canada) 1993, Hamilton (Bermuda) 1997, Jerusalem (Israel) 1998, London (England) 1999, Pittsburgh (USA) 2000, and Johannesburg (South Africa) 2001.

PARTICIPANTS IN THE WORLD SCHOOLS DEBATING CHAMPIONSHIPS

1993: Medicine Hat, CANADA
DEBATERS
Jeremy Folley
Nicholas Foreit
Jackeline Fuller
Hugo Huertas del Pino
Bernardo Payet
COACH
Sixto G. Ramos

1997: Hamilton, BERMUDA
DEBATERS
Alexandra Arens
Cristina Correa
Sarah Gilman
Johanna Holtz
Rodrigo Medrano
COACH
Sixto G. Ramos
JUDGE
Juddy Wayatt

1998: Jerusalem, ISRAEL
DEBATERS
Alexandra Arens
Gonzalo Coello
Cristina Correa
Sarah Gilman
Rodrigo Medrano
COACH
Sixto G. Ramos
JUDGE
Rosemarie Arens

1999: London, ENGLAND
DEBATERS
Alexandra Arens
Paul Bent
Cristina Correa
Daphnie Drassinower
Rodrigo Medrano
OBSERVERS
Tony Hernandez
Fernando Rodrigo
COACHES
Sixto G. Ramos
Rosemarie Arens

2000: Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania), USA
DEBATERS
Farah Arabe
Tony Hernandez
Javier Marin
Fernando Rodrigo
Heather Ylitalo-Ward
OBSERVER
Juan Ignacio Camet
COACHES
Sixto G. Ramos
Daphnie Drassinower

2001: Johannesburg, SOUTH AFRICA
DEBATERS
Alejandro Belmont
Adriana Roca
Fernando Rodrigo
COACH
Sixto G. Ramos
JUDGE
Daphnie Drassinower

DEBATE WORKSHOPS

1. For students of Colegio Roosevelt
2. For parents and teachers of the Roosevelt community
3. For teachers and students from others schools

DEBATE COURSE

This is an elective course designed for students in grades 9-12. It is a semester course and it gives the students a more intensive preparation on debate than the Debate Club does. They get involved in many different activities and participate of no less than six public debates. At the end of the course they have a final exam which has two parts: performance and theory.

FORMAL DEBATE IN PERU
1. Status
Formal debate in Peru is a very new activity. It started, as it has been said, in Colegio Roosevelt in 1992. However, this academic activity is gaining more and more adepts among other schools of Lima such as Carmelitas, Casuarinas, Magister, Newton, and Villa Maria. All these schools have participated in workshops and debating competitions organized and given by Colegio Roosevelt. Our immediate goal is to create the Peruvian Debating Association. We already have the draft of the statutes which will be analyzed and discussed with a lawyer and representatives of the five schools involved in debate to this point.

2. Expectations
The formal debate comes from the Anglo-Saxon countries. All of them include debate as part of their curricula (or curriculums). They offer debate in elementary, middle, and high school levels and continue in the university. This explains, probably, why students in those countries are able to speak with fluency, discuss convincingly, and analyze the problems in a deep way. Unfortunately in Latin countries (including France, Italy, and Spain), and especially the Latin American countries the formal debate is 'unknown'. Our idea in this area is to spread the formal debate to other schools in Lima, and eventually other parts of the country, but in Spanish. We are preparing the written material in Spanish which will be used in those schools. We are coordinating this work with Argentina because they also want to extend the debate to the schools where the instruction is offered in Spanish.

FORMAL DEBATE IN THE WORLD
Formal debate is gaining more cultors in more countries, but the Anglo-Saxon countries are the leaders in this matter. There are different styles of debate such as LINCOLN-DOUGLAS (one speaker per team), CROSS-EXAMINATION (two speakers per team), STANDARD (two speakers per team), PARLIAMENTARY, practiced mainly in Great Britain (one speaker). Australia introduced a variation in the standard style with a third speaker. This type of debate is used in world competitions. These competitions, that take place in a different country each year, are performed in English although the judges don't take into account the accent or the language limitations to evaluate the performance of debaters. They use three criteria: content (what the speakers say), style (how they say it), and strategy (how the speakers allocate their time and understand the issue.).