This was an excellent session with our St Philip's Debating & Interview Club.
Our skill focus this week looked at Team work - with a view to competitions at the end of term and our Socratic Debating Grading Certification and Competition at the Dicken's museum at the end of June.
Our newsround saw reference to the Euros, the UK General Election, and the G7 hosted by Italy.
For our warm up we then turned to our interview style philosophical question with an emphasis on 'why'/justification?:
'Should we still write letters?'
This saw a wide ranging discussion - with responses centring on cost, tradition, the writing industry and jobs, climate/deforestation points, a key life skill, the special nature of handwritten letters, speed of modern technology (emails, texts etc.) and the wider learning points about forming letters when first learning English. The majority supported modern technology and touch typing as the way forward in education.
Our main debate looked the motion:
'This House would make cooking classes compulsory in school'.
In voting, the group supported the idea of cooking classes as an option within the curriculum, but not a compulsory one.
It was widely felt that this was a life skill that helped with eating a healthy diet, and would be important in later life, beyond those looking for a career in the hospitality industry. Those against the compulsory element liked the idea of the skill, but felt that the curriculum was already stretched and Mathematics, Science and English should have a priority.
Well done all on an excellent discussion and debate and some impressive summary speaking too.
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