Young Debaters

As part of our award-winning Debate Hub initiative, we hosted the UK’s biggest debating competition for Junior School pupils this term.

We were delighted to welcome over 200 pupils to South Hampstead, as eager Year 5 pupils from 14 London schools, including our own Junior School, prepared to express themselves in a fun but competitive environment. Our Debate Coach, Mr Hepburn, has delivered workshops at a number of the participating schools this term, including The Orion School, Salusbury Primary School, Goldbeaters and St Stephen’s. The event was designed to encourage novice debaters to develop their skills of argumentation, as well as teaching them to listen, cooperate and to be good losers as well as gracious winners.

The 9 and 10 year olds tackled a range of topics with great enthusiasm, with motions such as ‘This House believes white lies do more harm than good’ and ‘This House believes students should strike on Fridays for climate action.’ The action-packed event, fuelled by plenty of sandwiches and juice, involved 85 debates, 171 debaters, 204 students and 513 speeches… out of 57 teams, after three rounds of debating, 11 teams from 8 schools ended the evening undefeated: Ark Franklin, St Stephen’s, Goldbeaters, Whitehall Park, Queen’s Gate, Trevor Roberts, Orley Farm and South Hampstead.

A team of our Senior School debaters helped out on the evening, led ably by our Head Girl Charlotte, chairing debates, transporting ballots and ensuring that everything ran smoothly.  Many thanks to them, Mr Hepburn, and to all our participating schools, for helping to make the inaugural event such a success.