This 2024-25 school year, Mr. Jonathan Dodd started teaching seventh and eighth-grade ELA, along with seventh-grade honors ELA (English Language Arts) class. On Tuesday, March 4, the seventh-grade honors ELA class did a class debate. Students got to pick their partners, or group of three, and their group was assigned to the pro or con side of the debate with half of the class on each side. The topic of the debate was whether homework is beneficial to students or not.
Mr. Dodd even switched around his classroom to fit the feel of a courtroom. There was a podium at the front of the room, the tables were placed in a U-shape, and there were chairs for the next speakers to sit in at the front. For about two days, students worked with their small groups to write a thesis statement, claim, two reasons and evidence, a counterclaim, and a rebuttal. The day before the debate, students gathered with the rest of the pro or con side of the group, were assigned a role, and started writing their arguments. The roles included speakers, writers, and jury members.
“I loved seeing how students were really working hard and working together. I thought it was cool to see how much [they] kind of like bought into the idea of like ‘we need to work on this and come up with a good argument as a team,’” Mr. Jonathan Dodd said. “I’d like to do it again, maybe many times. [Next time] I want to make sure that everybody is involved the whole time. It seemed like everybody was positive about it and enjoyed what they were able to do.”
Some students seem to learn better while being more active or involved in their work. Teachers need to include activities to keep students engaged in the topic.
“I think [this benefitted the class]. It let people work on the project differently; it helped them be really active. I saw people that normally don’t participate as much, participating more,” Mr. Jonathan Dodd said.
“I really liked [the debate], it was fun and enjoyable. I was a writer,” Presley Malsch, seventh-grade student, said. “I liked watching [the class] argue back and forth. I think it benefitted the class by helping us get together and talk more.”
The pro side of the argument ended up winning the debate, according to the jury. Students seemed to love the idea of this debate and hope they get to do something like this again. An activity like this can benefit students in many ways, and it seems like that’s exactly what it did.
