I posted a new product! Visit my store I Can Classical at Teachers Pay Teachers. I upload lessons for classical classroom and home educators to use at the middle and high school levels.
This one is on teaching disputation. I use this for middle grades, although if you have high school kids who have only just finished a logic course or who have never had any debate experience this would work for them as well.
Disputation is the medieval art of argumentation or debate. As students finish a course in formal logic it is important to show them what logic is actually for in a practical sense - namely rhetoric. This guide will help students apply logical thinking in a formal and fun way. Students will be introduced to the five-part form of a disputation, will review an example, will read and discuss an example of medieval disputation poetry, and will finally create their own formal written disputation.
This guide contains the following parts:
- A teacher guide that goes over the entirety of the lesson, and contains verbal prompts and sample answers. The teacher guide also includes extension opportunities.
- A student guide that contains the images and readings the students will discuss and contains spaces for students to take notes and write their responses.
This lesson will probably take anywhere from three to five 45-minute class sessions to complete if it is done in its entirety.
I hope that you enjoy introducing the art of clear thinking and rational argumentation to your students and hope that this can serve as the foundation for logical thinking, speaking, and writing in your classrooms!
