Asian Parliamentary Debate at DHIC

I teach English 2, Oral Communication course at Dae Han International College of Business and Technology and I indicated in the course syllabus that students will write a reflection paper of a case study on oral communication, something which focuses on either difficulties or overcoming difficulties in the said aspect. However, a sudden change of plan occured to me that I presented my students Debate as their final examination. Most of them agreed; thus, we discussed lessons on debate for the remaining sessions of the semester. I let them suggest topics for Debate a week before the presentation. However, they were not able to give any. I sought my fellow teacher's suggestion and surveyed the internet for debatable issues. Then, as we met I gave them the list of topics and let them rank those depending upon their preference. The topic chosen was "Do students get smarter because of the internet?". I chose Asian Parliamentary format and had them understand the matter before the Debate proper. And here's the outcome.

The Government Team - Jhomyrlyn Bernardo as the Prime Minister, Ronald Morales (in white) as the Deputy Prime Minister and Joel Gepega (in red) as the Whip

The Opposition Team - John Frederick Bernardo as the Leader of the Opposition, Cheska Bien Saavedra as the Deputy and Paul Bernard Ermitanio as the Whip

(L-R) Juan Agtalao as the Moderator, Kezzia Grace Baling as the Debate Coordinator and Kelvin James Reyes as the one in-charge of the time

Karlo Marinas (in black) was the videographer

The rest, Audience


The judges were Dr. Oliver Jentenilla (DHIC's Career Counselor), Mr. Eduardo Manalac (DHIC's Librarian) and I.  As the activity concluded, the Government emerged victorious as their Whip and the Prime Minister did exert efforts in defending their arguments to the best of their abilities.

The BEST DEBATER was awarded to Joel Gepega.

As a whole, the activity went fine despite the deputies' lapses of conscious awareness and because they made me see that they can do more than what I expected from them, I got impressed. The following are the pictures taken before, during and after the activity.

The Government Team

The Leader of the Opposition

The Opposition Team

Deputy Prime Minister of the Government

Deputy of the Opposition

The Opposition's Whip

Mr. Manalac, one of the Judges with the Debate Committee

Debater of the Year, The Whip of the Government Team