Eloquence

Activity 2: Choosing the Right Words

Step 1: The Power of Words- This activity requires the students to explore the way Delaware residents successfully stopped the power plant from being built. In small groups the students will read, "New Power Plant Stopped on University of Delaware Campus," an article posted online by the Sierra Club. The article clearly states the course of action that the Delaware residents took to ensure that the power plant was not successful. The students should identify and discuss the course of action. Also, at the end of the article Jen Wallace, a community activist, explains that part of the success can be attributed to their fact-based campaign. This is an important connection to make with the students. The students should be encouraged to think about the impact of using facts and evidence as opposed to just opinion and emotional appeals. ⁴⁵

Step 2: Speaking to Persuade- To help students understand the power of persuasive speech, they will watch Dr. Chajes, professor from University of Delaware, speak to city council in his speech "Do Everything You Can to Stop the Power Plant." Encourage the students to take notes as they listen to the speech related to the following topics: the speaker's style, clarity of his message, and the content of the speech. For students with auditory difficulties, a transcript of the speech is available under the "about" tab on the You Tube video page. ⁴⁶

Step 3: Debate- To facilitate the number of students in my classes, three different debate topics will be offered. The first, "Delaware should build a sea wall along its coastline as protection from the rising sea." The second is, "Delaware residents should be mandated to use ethanol E85 Flex Fuel in their cars." The third debate topic is, "Delaware should work toward the use of wind energy as its primary source of energy." I will pose all three debate topics by projecting them on the SMARTboard. I will allow the students some time to think about the topic they would like to debate on. Next, I will set up six stations in the room, two stations for each debate topic. I will label them as follows: sea wall affirmative, sea wall negative, ethanol E85 affirmative, ethanol E85 negative, wind power affirmative, and wind power negative. I will have the students make their final decision by moving to the appropriate table.

Next, I will explain to the students how the debate will be structured. I created a table to make the debate structure more comprehensible for the students.

Next, I will have the students choose their roles within their debate teams. The roles are as follows: speaker 1, speaker 2, speaker 3, and the remaining students are responsible for helping in the data collection, speech writing, and active listening. Once the roles have been established I will give the students time to look over their casebooks that contain articles related to their debate topic. Links to websites and articles are in the table below. Since access to the computers is problematic in my school, I will be giving the groups print copies of each item. They should highlight important facts and evidence that will help them in supporting their stance. Finally, the groups should begin writing a framework for the three speeches that will be delivered during the debate. I will tell the students that they must remember that to be effective, their speeches will have to be reworked throughout the debate to disprove the information of the other team.

Casebooks

The webpages and articles listed in the table below will be printed for each group of students to use in preparation for the debate. All of the information has been organized into the following categories: background information, costs, pros and cons, and real-world examples. The students will need to work together to sort through the information to determine what evidence should be used to prove their case. They should also think about the opposing team and what evidence they will most likely be using. The students will be given index cards and a small box to organize their findings. Having the facts written on index cards will allow the students to obtain the necessary information during the debate. Going back into the articles to find facts while the debate is going on will take much too long. The small boxes will have premade dividers using the same categories listed in the chart below.

Student Assessment/Check for Understanding

As the three debates are conducted in the classroom, there will be students waiting for their debate to take place or who have already participated in their debate. These students will be the judges of the debate. They will fill in the following chart to assess each of the debates that they are not actively participating in. By having the students evaluate their classmates, they gain a better understanding of the debate topics and will be less likely to engage in disruptive behavior. The chart was adapted from the Northwest Association for Biomedical Research's educational strategies on classroom debates. ⁴⁷

The completed position sheets and the following debate rubric will be used to deem the winning position for each debate.