Middle School Varsity Curriculum Guide

Welcome to Middle School Varsity!

Wow, you’ve made it all the way to the Varsity division! Working your way here from Novice is an accomplishment, and you should be proud just to be here. But now that you are here – what’s it like?

What’s Different in Varsity?

  • You’ll get more arguments than in Junior Varsity, including additional affirmatives, disadvantages, and advantages. It’ll be your job to stay on top of things!

  • You’ll get new kinds of arguments than the ones you had in Junior Varsity. These are counterplans and kritiks. Both give the judge a different course of action than the plan to support, which creates multiple worlds to debate about in the same round.

  • You’ll have more speech time. Constructives are now five minutes long, while rebuttals are three minutes. Cross-examination is still two minutes long.

  • You’ll have even better judging. Varsity rounds get the most experienced judges at tournaments, so you can trust your judge to have evaluated similar rounds many times before.

  • You’ll be able to do your own research. As long as you follow AUDL formatting, and as long as it’s new evidence, not an entirely new argument, you’re good to go.

What’s the Same in Varsity?

  • Debates still follow the same speech order.

  • You’ll still have to debate four rounds – two affirmative, and two negative – at each debate tournament.

  • You’ll still use your evidence packet and tournament workbook.

  • You’ll still be reading, speaking, taking notes, and asking questions (or answering them).

Table of Contents

Reviewing Junior Varsity

PART 1: New Skills

  1. Multiple Worlds

  2. The Counterplan

  3. Answering the Counterplan

  4. The Kritik

  5. Answering the Kritik

  6. Research and Evidence Production

PART 2: Developing Skills

  1. More on Choosing Arguments

  2. Varsity Speech Checklist

  3. Judge Instruction