4.1 The christmas/easter debate  (Page 7/4)

English first additional language

Grade 8

Celebrations

Module 16

The christmas/easter debate

Activity 1:

To listen actively in discussionslisten for specific informationinteract in additional languagedebate social and ethical issues

[lo 1.4, 1.3.1, 2.2.1, 2.4]

• Two of the major public holidays in South Africa are Easter and Christmas. These are both religious holidays and both have relevance to the Christian religion.
• There are people who are of the opinion that public holidays should not be linked to any religious festival. They argue that this amounts to favouritism and discrimination among religions.
• You will now have a debate around this issue.
• Your teacher will divide the class into two groups.
• Group One will support the national celebration of Christmas and Easter as public holidays.
• Group Two will oppose this and suggest that Easter and Christmas be a private and personal celebration. They will argue that South Africans be given the choice of using their leave benefits at work to celebrate these religious festivals.

About Debating:

Debating is more than just a class discussion. You are required to support and defend a particular point of view on a given topic. You will be given time to prepare yourself. Different roles will be assigned to different learners in the class.

These roles are:

1. A chairperson: This learner will be in control of the debate. (S) he opens and closes the proceedings. (S) he will never express a personal point of view or support either group.
2. A first speaker for each side. : These learners will each introduce their point of view before the debate starts in all earnest. When the topic has been thoroughly debated, these speakers will summarize their group’s argument.
3. The floor (an uneven number of learners): These learners’ sole purpose is to listen to the arguments and cast their vote at the end of the debate, based only on the arguments they have heard.