Thank you X for providing this forum to discuss our learnings together. 

I was actually excited to start preparations for the debate and particularly because I was given a position that I did NOT align with (at least initially). I decided to turn my initial disappointment about not getting the position that I believed in into a challenge. I needed to set aside my preconceived position and be open to what I uncovered in my research for both sides of the debate. I had to consciously keep myself aware of the biases of each side. 

I researched like a crazy women! I really needed to set some boundaries on knowing when enough was enough but over the weeks I did really enjoy the satisfaction of understanding, analyzing and connecting the research together to form my arguments.

I realized during this research stage how easy it is to become intellectually "lazy" as I had never put this amount of diligence into understanding a topic in along time. During the self reflection exercise, I felt some shame in that I noticed that over the past few years in particular, time constraints, complex work demands, and information overload have left me "glancing" over research and reading "short" briefing notes on complex issues and little time for conscious open reflection on the information and truly critically appraising the premises and conclusions presented in this material. 

Responding to everyone's feedback was curious for me as I would have liked to have said that "I am not my debate" and that I stayed disconnected from position and focused on the debate process. But in the end I did become quite attached personally and emotionally to the arguments that I was presenting. I had an actual shift in thinking from my original position.
As much as I wanted to stay in a neutral emotional position, I couldn't help but feel incredible gratification when someone agreed or supported my arguments during the feedback portion of the assignment. For those who disputed my arguments ...thank you! I found I needed to really pay deliberate attention to this feedback. This is where the greatest learning was for me. It is always so easy to only select out (either consciously or unconsciously) feedback that supports your debate position.This feedback uncovered my blind spots.

Was this an effective learning strategy? I have never thought so much about my thinking ever since the forum on logical reasoning was introduced!! ( I hope this makes sense?!). Frankly, I am exhausted! So is my husband as he wants me to stop identifying all of his fallacious arguments!! 

But seriously, I am so glad that this was the first course I have taken towards my Masters. I think that my approach to critically appraising premises in research and articles and the preparation of my own thoughts/opinions and conclusions is so much more informed by logical argumentation. THis will have a real positive impact on my next course ( I just got my textbooks on Nursing Philosophy!). Is anyone going be joining me? It would be great to have a familiar...uhh.... face? out there!!

I wanted to share some feedback on your comments to you and to everyone here. I read your responses and at once saw myself as the "peer" who had commented on your debate style vs. the content.
I actually went back to read how I presented this feedback and I can see how it could have been interpreted as negative feedback. My intentions were quite the OPPOSITE!
I was very intrigued and really felt REFRESHED with with the different choice of approach that you took. I really did try to present my questions based on curiousity not criticism. I hadn't done a debate since highschool too! I really got involved in trying to figure out how to best use the information I was gaining from my research in the most effective and "strategic" way and I was just curious as to whether you had explored this too!!
One of my take aways from your feedback for me is to really be thoughtful on how I present my feedback. Writing ( or posting) is such a one dimensional method of communication and I recognize how important it is for me to be clear in how I communicate my intentions.

Ok everyone....
today I participated in an education day and guess what teaching/learning strategy was used...DEBATE!
I wasn't sure if I should groan or smile with delight!!
We drew from the hat and I was a panel judge....ok...we never got to play this part in our debate!! 
But it sure was easy to design the evaluation method to determine the winner after this course...

Anyways...had to share...
Just wanted to be sure that I answered all of the questions and didn't want to leave anything incomplete!
I have now added debates into my repertoire of effective teaching strategies! I have adapted this to an activity for a workshop I am facilitating this Wednesday. I will let you know how it goes!
One thought I had was about the creation of the debate summary how to integrate and honor the feedback from my classmates (in agreement and against my arguments) as requested and yet not introduce new content into the summary as was outlined in my reading on debate technique? Just a thought as I am not sure if my summary statements were as strong as they could have been as I included some of the opposing feedback from others? Should have stuck with only the positive...ok but it isn't about winning but learning right!??
There is a phenomenal amount of information and research contained in these debates and papers. Consider just how short this course is and how much content was covered and it is really amazing.