Debate Information

Over the next few weeks, we will hold in-class debates. Students will be divided into two teams on each side. The speaking order will be as follows:

Opening Arguments
1st Proposition Speaker... 4 minutes
1st Opposition Speaker... 4 minutes
2nd Proposition... 4 minutes
2nd Opposition... 4 minutes

Summary (Rebuttal-no new arguments)
3rd Opposition... 3 minutes
3rd Proposition... 3 minutes

The proposition team will present a topic for debate. They can choose from the following list of issues, or they can choose another topic of their choice (but run it by me first...). Here are some sample topics:

-Good things come to those who wait.
-It is better to save time than money.
-Love is foolish.
-Conventionality is not morality
-Technology is killing our work ethic.
-"History" is not "her story."
-Dogs are better pets for humankind than cats.
-The students should run the school.
-Privacy is more important than security.
-There is, in this age, a dearth of heroes.
-Society today has an unhealthy obsession with sports.
-What costs little is of little worth.
-"Ex's" should not remain friends.
-Freedom of the individual is a myth.
-Art is in the eye of the beholder.

If you would like more background on academic debate, see the following article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debate.

"Fly" by Nick Drake

Please give me a second grace
Please give me a second face
I've fallen far down
The first time around
Now I just sit on the ground in your way
Now if it's time for recompense for what's done
Come, come sit down on the fence in the sun
And the clouds will roll by
And we'll never deny
It's really too hard for to fly.
Please tell me your second name
Please play me your second game
I've fallen so far
For the people you are
I just need your star for a day
So come, come ride in my street-car by the bay
For now I must know how fine you are in your way
And the sea sure as I
But she won't need to cry
For its really too hard for to fly.

Group Project: Fix That Song (due Oct. 25)

The words that follow are the words to an actual song. Unfortunately, the words have become a bit mixed up. Your assignment is to take these words and make a new song. It does not matter if the new song lines are similar to the old song--all that matters is that the song should be put together using correct English. Try your best to use each words once and to use only the words contained below (but you can add extra words if you absolutely have to). Work together in a group of 2 to 4 people (but no more). Bring your song lines to our next class.

game
come
know
for now
Please
down
done
your
if
a day
clouds
recompense
grace
way
on the
deny
the
I've
Please
me
roll
down
ride
play
me
your
really
fallen
sure
And
a second
around
star
your
need
bay
come
Please
second
on the
in
too
will
name
ground
me
my
people
face
give
the sea
how
sit
time
give
a
first time
sun
hard
cry
I've
Now
far
just
way
So
for
must
the
now I
come
fence
what's
it's
to
never
streetcar
we'll
for
fine
your
fly
far
for
and
fly
second
sit
in the
too
to
won't
I
by
so
are
I
And
for
fallen
tell
she
as
just
hard
it's
Please
the
are
it's
come
to
your
the
need
but
me
second
for
you
really
I
in
by
for
you
in
to

Poems

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
and then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

-Langston Hughes

----------

The people upstairs all practice ballet
Their living room is a bowling alley
Their bedroom is full of conducted tours.
Their radio is louder than yours,
They celebrate week-ends all the week.
When they take a shower, your ceilings leak
They try to get their parties to mix
By supplying their guests with Pogo sticks,
And when their fun at last abates,
They go to the bathroom on roller skates.
I might love the people upstairs more
If only they lived on another floor.

-Ogden Nash

----------

Spring is like a perhaps hand

(which comes carefully

out of Nowhere)arranging

a window,into which people look(while

people stare

arranging and changing placing

carefully there a strange

thing and a known thing here)and


changing everything carefully


spring is like a perhaps

Hand in a window

(carefully to

and fro moving New and

Old things,while

people stare carefully

moving a perhaps

fraction of flower here placing

an inch of air there)and


without breaking anything.

-e.e. cummings

----------

Like a fading piece of cloth

I am a failure


No longer do I cover tables filled with food and laughter

My seams are frayed my hems falling my strength no longer able

To hold the hot and cold


I wish for those first days

When just woven I could keep water

From seeping through

Repelled stains with the tightness of my weave

Dazzled the sunlight with my

Reflection


I grow old though pleased with my memories

The tasks I can no longer complete

Are balanced by the love of the tasks gone past


I offer no apology only

this plea:


When I am frayed and strained and drizzle at the end

Please someone cut a square and put me in a quilt

That I might keep some child warm


And some old person with no one else to talk to

Will hear my whispers


And cuddle

near

-Nikki Giovanni

---------
 
"There must be some way out of here," said the joker to the thief,

"There's too much confusion, I can't get no relief.

Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth,

None of them along the line know what any of it is worth."


"No reason to get excited," the thief, he kindly spoke,

"There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke.

But you and I, we've been through that, and this is not our fate,

So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late."


All along the watchtower, princes kept the view

While all the women came and went, barefoot servants, too.


Outside in the distance a wildcat did growl,

Two riders were approaching, the wind began to howl.

-Bob Dylan