Student Training
Bespoke student workshops in the form of half-day, full-day, or weekly after-school session, as well as debating festivals and competitions. Available for students of all ages and abilities to suit a range of different outcomes.
Over the last seven years Debate Mate has trained over 5,000 students through our workshops, in addition to over 15,000 through our Core Programme. Our student training workshops are completely bespoke and led by our university mentors who are experienced coaches, and competitive debaters themselves.
Our workshops can be tailored for beginner, intermediate, or advanced debaters, and have been successful across a wide range of abilities, key stages, and subject areas.
Full-Day
A full-day ‘Introduction to Debating’ workshop includes sessions on:
- Introduction to making arguments
- Speaking stylistically
- Responding to arguments and quick-thinking
- Roles in a debate, the format, and judging
- Debate challenge with detailed feedback and self-reflection
A sample full-day schedule can be found here.
SampleWorkshops
All of our student training workshops can be tailored to fit your requirements and are for all ages from primary to sixth-form. We can work with as many students as you like, from 15 to an entire year group.
Examples of student training workshops include:
- Full-day or half-day workshops themed around subject areas or issues
- Introduction to debating
- Booster sessions for experienced debate clubs, in preparation for competitions
- Oracy intervention days
- Behavioural intervention programmes
- Debate-focused transition programmes for years 6-7, and years 11-12
- Team-building sessions
- University guidance and interview preparation
Weekly Clubs
Alongside running our Core Programme, Debate Mate also runs weekly debating clubs across the UK. Typically working on a 5 to 10-week cycle, our debate clubs run on a day and time that works best for you both after and during school time.
Led by our university mentors, our weekly debating clubs
include sessions on:
- Introduction to making arguments
- Speaking stylistically
- Structuring arguments
- Responding to arguments and quick-thinking
- Roles in a debate, the format, and judging
“We decided to give all students from Y6 upwards a taste of the Debate Mate experience with a half-day session for everyone. The feedback from those involved was all positive – many of them were outside their comfort zones. We have followed this up with weekly sessions and are now oversubscribed for our Debate Mate Club. ”Haberdasher's Aske's School for Girls, Teacher
“Debate mate has empowered me and my classmates to become more confident speakers over the year. We have gone through a lot of changes in Year 6 this year, and Debate Mate has been an amazing opportunity I would not have missed.”Student
“We have received overwhelmingly positive feedback from our students about the day - they enjoyed the pace and variety of activities, as well as the formal debate and the competitive side of debating. The students seem really keen to continue with debating as an extra-curricular activity.”Bedford High School, Teacher
“Debate Mate has made me more confident in public speaking, and has enabled me to use emotive language in order to persuade and entice an audience”Student