Debate: 13th of Oct. '13

My school's debate supervisors and teams photo in BPK Penabur's lobby

Today is the second day of the debate competition. We got to the quarter finals! Even though we did not get into the semi finals my team were very grateful. We didn't expect to get into the quarter finals. I believe my team learned a lot from the debate competition. I myself did learn a lot from the debate competition. I learned that a debate competition will more or less look like the way it looked in this debate competition, three tables facing three other tables, and on their adjacent sides are a table for the speaker and a few other tables for the adjudicator(s) to sit on. The opposition team will formulate their arguments outside the room and they will never pass the government team's tables. I also learned from this debate competition that when someone does not understand the topic of the debate that much, she or he shouldn't be the first or third speaker because the second speaker gets to be directed by the first speaker and clarified by the third speaker if she or he said something incorrectly. I learned that we shouldn't take too many POIs because it will disturb how the adjudicator understand what we are saying. If we don't understand the subject of the debate that well, we shouldn't be taking POIs too because if we cannot answer the POIs, it will just give the adjudicator an impression that we do not understand what we are saying. In today's debate rounds my team lost twice and won once. We soon realized a pattern in our winning. Since yesterday we win then lose then win. We never win or lose twice in a row. This is an interesting fact that we found during the debate. I realized that debate isn't all about stressing, being nervous, winning or losing. I can find the fun in it too. Like small things like knowing that there is a patter to my team's winning is also interesting. Thus, I look forward to the next debate meeting and possibly competition.