Another very impressive session with our St Philip's Debating & Interview Club and well done those in the group for having followed the complex events in the House of the Commons of the last week. Our skill focus this week looked at POIs and how best to implement these important interjections during debates.
Our warm up question asked:
'If you could study a new language, what would it be and why?'
This saw a wide range of options from German, to Spanish, Italian, Polish, and Mandarin with very good explanation in each case, from widening cultural understanding to spending time with friends and family, and potential business opportunities later in life. We also saw a number of the group put forward Classics - Ancient Greek and Latin as important to the curriculum.
Our newsround saw topics raised from the Speaker in the House of Commons, to the 2-year anniversary of the war in Ukraine, 80 year DD anniversary, the conflict in Gaza, Red Sea Shipping disruption, and Space exploration.
With The Today Programme covering the story of exploration in the Antarctica and our very own Socratic colleague Georgina having just been on an expedition there, we looked at the motion:
(i) 'This House would allow tourism to Antarctica'.
Voting was split at the outset, but gradually moved over the course of the debate to being in favour of the motion at the second telling. It was strongly felt that experience, time spent in Antarctica helped with learning about this precious space and raising awareness more generally. Checks and balances (perhaps having a cap on the 100,000 record hit this year) biosecurity and expeditions accompanied by professional researchers were put forward as ways of allowing tourism to continue. Many in the group said they would like to visit this remarkable landscape if ever the opportunity arose.
Well done all on excellent argumentation and some superb POIs.
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