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Middle School Novice Curriculum Guide
Making Arguments
Debate is a competitive game, and your job is to beat your opponent. To do so, you must convince the judge to vote for your side by making arguments. But at the end of the round, the judge can only pick one team, so you need to make strong arguments. How do you do that? A good argument has three parts, and you can use the acronym ARE to remember them.
Assertion. An assertion is the basic point you’re trying to make. It should be short and clear – if someone only hears this part of your argument, they should have a good idea what it’s about.
Reasoning. The reasoning supports your assertion. It provides some logic to suggest that what you’ve claimed is true, and it should be convincing to the judge.
Evidence. The facts that back up your assertion and reasoning. The best evidence comes from experts who cite statistics, past examples, or other hard realities about the world. You’ll have plenty of evidence to work with in your evidence packets. You can find that on our website here.
Here’s an example of how you could use ARE to make the argument that pets are good for your health:
Assertion. Pets are good for your health…
Reasoning. …because they can help calm you down in stressful situations…
Evidence. …proven by a 2002 study published in Psychosomatic Medicine that showed pet owners had lower blood pressure than non-pet owners that you can find here.