Notes in school debating

• For many speakers, notes are helpful to maintain structure – you can easily get carried away by emotions or get distracted by the other team’s points of information.
• Notes make you feel more confident – they work as a safety net in case you should blackouts.
• In a prepared debate, it can be necessary to offer facts and numbers in your substantive speech that you can impossibly remember.
• It can always happen that team members are absent. To ensure that fellow speakers can take your place in a debate, they need a set of notes.

 General rules and strategy

• Don’t use too many cards!
• Share your notes with the coach or at least one other team member!
• Practice with your real notes!
• Use smaller cards to exchange information with your teammates during the debate (PoI, arguments…).

The layout of your notes

• Use only one side of the card!
• Use simple cards that don’t distract the audience!
• Add numbers!
• Use a color code!
• Include stage directions – “hold up prop”, “point at OPP”!
• Generally, use key words – you won’t feel tempted to read out the speech!
• Write out the first words of your introduction!
• Write out your definitions!
• Write out transitions like “Now, let’s have a look at” …
• Write out quotes to make sure they are accurate!
• Write out technical phrases and everything else that must be given verbatim!
• Write out statistics and the phrases you will use to paraphrase them!

Delivery: How to handle your notes

• While speaking in a debate, use your notes with discretion!
• Hold the cards in one hand – don’t change!
• If there is a chance to place your notes on a lectern, do so!
• Look at your audience, not at your notes!
• Don’t memorize the lines on your notes!
• Once you’ve used a note card, place it somewhere else – don’t rearrange them!