Pegasus Story | Pegasus Debate Female Talent: Debate is a bit like a more rational argument
Release Time：2021-02-06 12:12
Debate on the whole is a very comprehensive thing. You can have an adequate preparation, but it does not mean that you will get very good results in the competition. Improvising on thinking is needed. This is why I choose to debate. After participating in the first debate competition, I felt it quite interesting and persisted. Debate is a bit like a more rational argument.
She set up NSDA Debate Club during her second year at Pegasus.
And for 2020 NSDA Qingdao District Debate Competition, her team won three of the four awards
Including "High School Debate Champion" and "Best Debater"
Two highest honors of the event!
The club she set up was not only officially certified by NSDA And she herself was appointed to be NSDA campus ambassador.
The club she set up was not only officially certified by NSDA And she herself was appointed to be NSDA campus ambassador.
She is Sarah from the 10th grade of Pegasus. At the beginning,
she "felt herself incompetent" in debate and later became one of Qingdao's best debaters.
What wonderful stories will Sarah share with us?
The following is the transcript of an interview with Sarah.
she "felt herself incompetent" in debate and later became one of Qingdao's best debaters.
What wonderful stories will Sarah share with us?
The following is the transcript of an interview with Sarah.
That means there are four awards. We won three of them.
The establishment of the Club is from 0 to 1. Principal Taylor, the history teacher and the online training by NSDA are very helpful to us.
Hello, everyone! I am Sarah. I have been in Pegasus for two years and now a tenth grade student. I set up the NSDA Debate Club at Pegasus. The original intention is to help my schoolmates learn about debate, learn debating together and if there are related competitions, I will take my club members to participate in the competitions.
I started the Club at the beginning of Grade 10. Before that and the ninth grade, I did not have any thought about or intention for this. At that time, I felt that I was not competent. A few days before the start of the tenth grade, Principal Taylor found me and told me that my oral expression was good. It was because such an idea and encouragement that inspired me to try and set up the club. At present, we have a total of 22 members. I believe there will be more schoolmates to join us in the future.
After the club was founded, we had regular activities every week and our history teacher teaches us some basic knowledge about debate every week. In addition, I also made contact with the organizing committee of Qingdao NSDA who also gave us several online trainings, which are very helpful to my members. Many of us started to learn about debate for the first time.
When we participated in the large competition for the first time and achieved “ a big harvest ".
After that, we signed up for the NSDA debate contest in Qingdao on December 13th. There were four groups of debaters. Two of the contestants became partners and one of my schoolmates worked as the volunteer for the competition. Finally, I won the championship with a partner from another high school and the other team won the third place. One of my schoolmates also won the title of Best Debater, that is to say, there are four awards, three of which were won by us.
Sarah（right）
There is water in the sponge if it is squeezed.
The Challenge of Managing the Club.
The biggest challenge after starting a club is that it takes time and energy. I thought the tenth grade was very busy and had no time to manage the club, but I didn't expect that there is water in the sponge if it is squeezed. In fact, it doesn't take a lot of time. I think the most important thing is that our partners are very cooperative. In private, we are also very good friends. Managing the Debate Club, Sarah improved her leadership.
The most direct benefit from this experience for me is practicing my leadership because I am the president of the club, usually urging the club members to watch some debate video classes or explaining some the debate knowledge. When it is time to participate in the competition, I also need to communicate and confirm with the debaters many times. In fact, if in normal life, you basically do not have the opportunity to manage a team.
Unlike the speech contest, the debate needs to be done on the spot.
Speaking of the debate itself, I had participated in the speech contest until my first year at Pegasus. The debate was characterized by the fact that almost everything needed to be done on the spot. Even if you were well prepared, you stood on the stage and your opponent asked you questions which maybe you hadn't prepared at all, so the biggest gain of the debate was my ability to play on the spot.
Oral English, Reading, Dialectical Thinking... She also benefited a lot.
In addition, in terms of the English language, the debate competition requires you to play on the spot, but also use all English to express, which has improved my oral English ability. There is a time limit for every section of the debate, which requires me to speak as fast and organized as possible in a limited time. Second, English reading ability, because of the competition, we must surf the Internet to find evidence. Usually when I prepare for the debate, there are often more than 20 English web pages and some materials need to be extracted from some articles. It is impossible to Google the answer. After all, the more evidence, the better; the more comprehensive, the better.
One more thing, the claim and the counterclaim are decided by tossing a coin. When I was preparing for the competition, I needed to prepare the script of both sides, which also greatly improved my critical thinking. Because when you are thinking about a question, you need to think about the pros and cons of the argument at the same time, if you want me to put forward an argument with what point of view the other side will refute, and when making a decision, I will first think about its adverse aspects, refute each other and then move forward.
2020 NSDA Debate Competition Qingdao Division Award Ceremony
Debate is a bit like a more rational argument
Across the mountain of making a speech, the scenery here is beyond compare.
In fact, at the beginning, I chose to participate in speech contests just because that the debate was too difficult and I didn't have any awards. The speech was much easier than the debate, easier to develop self-confidence and did not need you to do a lot of preparation. You just have to memorize the script and present it on stage.
After that, I chose the debate because NSDA only offers debate and speech contests. Generally speaking, the next step is to challenge the more difficult debate. At the beginning of the debate, I didn't volunteer because I thought the debate was too difficult. I had watched the debate before and I could not understand anything. Afterwards, I participated in the debate contest myself. I remember it was my first time to participate in the contest in the ninth grade and got the third prize in Qingdao Division. I did not expect to get the third prize. After all, it was the first time for me to take part in a competition and I was very nervous. It is not that you are ready and you will play very well.
Debate on the whole, is a very comprehensive thing. You can have an adequate preparation, but it does not mean that you can get very good results. It needs you to improvise on thinking and this is why I choose to debate. After the first debate competition, I know I was nervous but still felt it quite interesting. Debate is a bit like more rational argument. I will still take my club members to take part in the competition each year.
NSDA Official Certification of the Club set by Sarah
“The Ideal of Slowpoke Whale" & " Pegasus Campus Image Ambassador "
The purpose of creating an official WeChat Platform is to urge myself
“The ideal of the slowpoke whale" is the personal WeChat Platform I founded in 2017. Since I usually have some English online classes, I usually have classes at school, so I want to write some English articles or do some PPT and presentations.
At the beginning of having my WeChat Platform, it was also to urge myself to post some English articles that I write. That is not to say that I wrote something for my WeChat Platform, but sometimes it was like taking part in a large competition. The WeChat Platform is unlike anything else. If you give up, you may never touch it again .It is always there. When you think of it ,you post some articles. If not, it is ok.
I took part in a writing contest in the New York Times in my ninth grade about the American LGBT( Rainbow Clan) riots and I wrote an article on the WeChat Platform. And. In March, when the epidemic came to an end, I also wrote an article about the epidemic and its impact on my life.
The meaning of writing WeChat Platform articles is that although I often stopped posting articles, when I see what I have posted before, I feel like I keep doing one thing, and sometimes I have a sense of achievement. Another benefit is to improve my English.
You are welcome to follow “The Ideal of Slowpoke Whale”
Becoming a Pegasus school Ambassador is more like a recognition of me.
Recently, I also competed for becoming the image ambassador of Pegasus. First of all, I saw the requirements written by the school. I thought I meet all of them and went to the interview. After I was elected, I felt that it was more like a recognition of me by the school. Although I usually participated in the debate competition, it was only an honor from outside of my school. I didn't do anything for the school. But after election, I feel that the school also recognizes my ability. Of course, in the future I will actively support the work of the school!