Video transcript
NSW Premier's Debating Challenge 2021 - Years 5 and 6 State Final

[intro music]

TONY DAVEY: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the 2021 State Final of the Premier's Debating Challenge for Years 5 and 6. My name is Tony Davey, and I'm the debating and public speaking assistant for the Department of Education. And I'm coming to you from the Cammeraygal land.

Now, as for one good for me to acknowledge them. But, of course, the main people you're hearing from today are at Bangalow and Terrigal. So we're going to hear from each one of them as they give us an acknowledgment of the lands that they're coming to us from. Today starting up at Bangalow.

ZALI BLACK: [non-english speech]

We acknowledge the traditional custodians of this land, the Arakwal people of the Bundjalung nation. We are grateful for the Winding Creek Balonne and the Bangalow palm trees. They are not just pretty, but also a source of food, water, and materials for the Arakwal people.

We are thankful we can learn whilst we play on this land. We respect and love our [non-english speech] land. We treat all elders with [non-english speech], respect. We will take action to protect, unite, and connect with country.

GRACE HAYDN: Terrigal Public School acknowledges the traditional custodians of the land on which we meet today, the Darkinjung people. We recognise and pay our respects to the elders both past and present for they hold the memories, tradition, cultures, and hopes of Aboriginal Australia. We further extend our respect to all Aboriginal people present today.

TONY DAVEY: Cracking work, guys. So as I say, welcome to this State Final of the Premier's Debating Challenge for Years 5 and 6. I'm just going to run through a couple of tiny things about the competition to give you a bit of context before I hand you over to the chairpersons for the day, and we get this underway.

So very quickly, it was obviously a slightly different year in the Premier's Debating Challenge for Years 5 and 6. But we still had, I think, 948 teams across New South Wales enter. And that's just this age division of the competition. That led to more than 1,300 Round Robin debates. All of them a little bit before COVID kicked in.

So it's an incredible effort from your teachers. And then, of course, once COVID did happen, we had to shorten the competition. But that didn't mean we didn't have a real final series. There have still been more than 100 knockout finals to get us to this stage today.

And by the way, for that to happen, the teachers at Terrigal and Bangalow Public School, this is the seventh knockout final that they're organising this term. So those teachers and everyone who supported Terrigal and Bangalow obviously need a massive round of applause to start today off. Give them a hand, guys. Cracking.

So I'm sure you can tell it's going to be a brilliant final between some really battle-tested teams. With that, just a quick reminder to the audience to leave your cameras off and stay unmuted. And one last thing about the timing today. There's going to be a clock appear beside me, and it's going to turn green at 3 minutes, orange at 4 minutes, and it will turn red at 5 minutes, because it needs you to be quiet now. But you'll hear a little bit more about the timing from our chair people. Bangalow Public School, take us away.

ZALI BLACK: Yeah. Welcome to the final of the Premier's Debating Challenge for Years 5 and 6. Today each speaker may speak for 4 minutes. There will be a warning bell at 3 minutes and 2 bells at 4 minutes. There will be a continuous bell at 5 minutes.

The adjudicators for this debate is Jeremiah, Maya, and Anna-Sophia. Our negative team for this debate is Bangalow Grain. Our first speaker is Alice. Our second speaker is Nina. And our third speaker is Annabelle. And our fourth speaker is June. Over to you, affirmative chairperson.

TONY DAVEY: Thanks a lot. The affirmative team is called the Terrigal Tigers. Their first speaker is Grace Haydn. The second speaker is Sophie Semetka. Their third speaker is Abby Peterson-Hampshire. And their fourth speaker is Bethany Johnston. The topic today is that primary school students should have to do at least 5 hours of homework each week over the holidays.

Before we kick off, please make sure that all of your mobile phones are switched off. And now please welcome our first speaker of the affirmative, Grace Haydn.

GRACE HAYDN: Right now, we have a massive problem. Kids are coming back to school set way back because they haven't done any work for the past 2 or especially 6 weeks. This makes work so much harder for teachers and the students to try and catch up.

Kids are also finding themselves bored and spending a majority of their time on pointless screens or with nothing to do. Parents are stuck on trying to deal with bored kids. If we implement our change to give kids 5 hours of tasks to do whilst on holidays, they will come back to school ready to learn because they've done the work.

They won't be so bored because they will be given a bunch of fun activities to do, such as physical challenges, cooking experiments, tasks, and as well as some maths and English revision. We define find the topics is old primary school students will do 5 hours of homework per week over the holidays. These 5 hours can be split up through the week.

For example, 1 hour, 5 days a week. This homework will consist of a matrix created by classes on the final 1 or 2 weeks of school. This house will include reading, fun physical activity, challenges, cooking tasks, science experiments, art tasks, and as well as a balanced amount of English and maths revision to prepare them for back to school.

Kids can send videos and/or photos of the tasks they have completed to the teacher. And teachers will simply need to check in on what they've been sent once a week, as tasks would have been set from the matrix. The teachers will be lenient when it comes to families going away on holidays, but they can still find ways to do tasks such as reading or some revision. We plan to implement this change by the autumn holidays of 2022.

I, the first speaker, will be arguing that kids will be ready to learn when we go back to school, gives kids structure to the holidays, and my final argument will show that homework won't be just English and maths. My second speaker Sophie will argue that the change will make it easier for parents. This will be preparation for high school, and the change will reduce some screen time.

Now on to my arguments. My first argument will show that our model will lead to more ready-to-learn kids. And when they come back to school, making it easier for both students and teachers. We all know what happens when we go back to school after a break.

Kids have completely forgotten what they've learnt last year or last term, and it takes weeks to revise to get them back to where they were. This puts stress on teachers who, instead of teaching the new content that has been planned to do, they have to spend several weeks getting kids back to a certain level. Kids are stressed because they haven't done any form of schoolwork for ages and are struggling with the work given to them.

If we make it the kids are doing 5 hours of productive activities awake, they will come back to school prepared and ready to learn because they've been given amount out of revision so they don't forget what they've learnt, as well science experiments, cooking, physical challenges that get their brain switched on to keep them engaged instead of spending hours in front of a screen.

They could be doing fun activities from a matrix that still keeps them engaged, and they're meant to still be learning whilst having plenty of time to relax. If we implement our model, kids will be able to learn so much better when they come back to school, easing the pressure on teachers and students and improving their academic performance.

My second argument will show that homework won't just be sheets in maths or comprehension cards. Under our model, we'll try and make this as fun as possible for kids. And at the end of the term, teachers will give students a matrix with all types of activities that will vary from science experiments to cooking and physical activities.

Students are still learning while doing these fun activities. Like in cooking, they will be learning fractions. And in science experiments, they will be learning what chemicals react to one another.

My third and final argument will show that this model gives kids a good structure for the holidays. Right now, schools give students a 6-week holiday. I mean, if you think about it, most of the time, kids will be on their screens, wasting away their holidays. What more can you really do?

If we implement this model, it will be set, clear, and fun, exciting structure for the holidays. And now you probably think that this might disconnect friends from each other. But these tasks won't just be independent.

You can do them either independently or with a friend because, as we said, some of these tasks might be cooking and experiments which you know you can do with more than one person. So you do get to experience these fun and sociable activities with your friends.

Also, with reading, you can maybe start a book club with your friends so it's not just you doing this homework and being so boring and gloomy as you might think it might be. We are trying to make this as fun for kids as possible. And that is why we are proud to affirm on the topic that all primary school students should have at least 5 hours of homework a week during the holidays. Thank you.

ZALI BLACK: Please welcome our first speaker for the negative. Alice.

ALICE WOODS: Can I go? Chairperson adjudicator opposing team and members of the audience. We agree with the definition, but totally disagree with the topic. But before I get to my case, I would like to point out some obvious flaws in the other team's argument.

The other team said kids will be refreshed and ready to learn at the start of the year. Well, kids won't be because they will be stressed out on the work they will have to get done on the holidays, when they should be having fun and enjoying themselves. Lots of kids will obviously postpone the work and not do it till the end of the holidays, and then there will be a rambling to scrambling to go get it done, and they'll become really stressed.

And they're probably not actually going to learn that much. It's not going to be beneficial because the whole point of a teacher is to teach them. And if they don't have face to face with their teacher, especially primary school students, young students, they're actually not going to learn much, so it will be unbeneficial.

The other team said structure. As I'll be talking about in an example in the later debate, kids want to remember their revision, and they'll be stressed. They're not going to remember it because they're probably not even going to do the work. As I said before, they're young. They won't want to do it.

And some families might not even have the stuff to do science things or cooking and stuff. So that's just an extra thing that they'll become stressed about. The other team said it'll give them something to do.

Let's be honest. No kids are going to do, want to do maths and English revision when they're on holidays. They're going to plan fun activities so they can go out and enjoy themselves with friends doing something that they actually want to do. And they could do sport or some other activity that's not the work because to get exercise.

My team's first point is holidays are meant to be for a break. And kids aren't going to remember anything. And my second speaker will speak about it's much extra work for the teachers, and kids won't even do it.

Holidays for students and teachers is meant to be a break from learning and work. Students and teachers are already stressed and tired when it comes to the end of the year. When it comes to holidays, kids and teachers are meant to relax and enjoy themselves so they can prepare themselves for the next year.

So that's why my first point is holidays are meant for breaks, so people can unwind, relax and get ready for the next year and be refreshed and ready to learn to their best abilities. Right now, students are spending their well-deserved holiday, spending quality time with family and friends and relaxing and having some fun and boosting their mental health.

But when the rule comes into place, students will not only not have as much time to spend quality time with their family and friends, they'll also be worrying, stressing over the 5 hours of work they have to complete each week. And this will affect their mental health negatively because they won't be able to relax because they will be stressing over the work they have to complete.

For example, stressing students out will negatively affect them mentally because they are worried they might get in trouble for not completing their work or rushing through it because they want to have fun, because they're little. So when they return to school, they are not in a positive mindset so they can't knuckle down and focus on their work and do their work to their best ability.

That's important because we don't want students to be in a negative mindset because it will affect their mental health badly, and kids won't be able to focus on their work. So that is why kids shouldn't have to work 5 hours each week on the holidays.

Let's face it. If they are kids, they're not going to spend an hour each day on homework, when they could be at the beach playing with their friends spending quality time with their family and doing any other thing than homework. This is my second point. There is no point getting kids to do homework during the holidays, as they won't remember anything and will avoid doing it until it is due, and they will rush it. And they weren't learning.

What kid is going to spend a relaxing holiday slaving around doing unbeneficial, boring homework they won't even remember and they don't understand? Right now, kids can relax and enjoy the holiday, meaning when they return to school, they are ready to learn. But after the change, kids will avoid their homework altogether until a few days before the school starts again.

They will suddenly remember they have to do it, that they have homework to complete, meaning they will rush and stress about getting it done and will either not finish it or hand in poor and very badly done work. And they will not actually learn anything. Kids will also be stressed about if they don't complete it, what consequence they might have to face.

This will affect them mentally as they wont remember any of the work. It is not even beneficial to the education as kids don't remember most of the work, and they will rush it because then they won't remember it because they're not getting taught by an actual teacher. And they'll rush it, meaning they are not putting their best into it and will either not get it done or not put effort into it.

For example, if you showed the holidays without this change where kids are relaxed and stress free, then you showed it with this change where kids are stressed rushing their work, not remembering it, or just not doing it. It clearly shows how this change will negatively impact them. This is why primary school students shouldn't do at least 5 hours of homework each week.

SOPHIE SEMETKA: The opposition stated that this will affect their mental health because they are rushing through with the homework. Yes, it will affect their mental health, but beneficially. Because, well, if you think about it, we're learning. Learning is good for mental health.

And they're saying that, oh, they'll be stressed out with so much. Oh, how are we going to be stressed out with cooking and doing these fun activities? And plus, as we said in the definition, that the teachers will be lenient.

And it will affect them beneficially because we'll be also adding physical activity. Physical activity adds so much physical health and mental health. All together, it's just beneficial.

They also said that if we can't get a face to face, like if we won't get talk face to face, we won't learn much. As we said in the definition, we'll be doing online Zoom, which is basically like face to face. And it's kind of the same as we did at learning at home, which did help, and we still got to learn kind of the exact same as we would face to face. And it wouldn't be that much of a struggle.

They said that kids are meant to feel refreshed and ready. Yes, exactly. That's why we are doing these activities. We are doing these activities to make them feel ready for when they go to, say, high school or to school.

Because we'll be teaching them just, I guess, the normal basis of maths and English, but we'll also be teaching them stuff that they don't know, such as cooking, STEM activities, which is fun and exciting. And they won't have to pile on all this stress because they know that they know what they're going to be doing.

They also said that kids will be stressed out on focusing on the work. Teachers will set the homework at the end of the term when they have finished their report cards. And that's the time when they usually have a bit of a break, say, 2 weeks and stuff, which is enough time to set homework that is simple and easy and not much of a hassle.

Yeah. And moving on to my arguments. My first argument will show that under our model, life will be so much easier for parents. Imagine you as a parent on holidays with a 6-year-old and an 8-year-old. They keep bugging you, saying that they're bored, sad, and want to go to the park. But you also have to juggle work and keeping their home clean and tidy.

By teachers sending an activities matrix home, parents will be able to focus on their work. Once these things have been completed, these parents will feel calm and refreshed. They will also be able to spend time with their families. This is so important to support our parents' well-being.

My second argument will show that if this were to be put in a place, it would be a great preparation for high school. Right now, when a year 7 go off to high school, they get a rude shock, finding out about all the assignments they have to do, which is much more compared to what primary schools have to do. That they have to find out the assignments they must complete in the holidays.

Picture your teacher says, also don't forget to hand in your English assignments during the second week of the holidays. What? This would be a terrible surprise. So starting them now would make this reality become normal to them. Easing them into this routine is so important.

Moving on to my third argument. My third argument will show how our model will be so much better for kids' mental and physical health. Right now, during the holidays, kids are spending so much time on screens and sport is off. So they aren't being active. And they aren't getting the chance to activate their brain during this time.

The screen time alone is a massive problem on its own with kids spending hours on video games and watching TV because they are bored. Because of all of this, they are spending so much less time being active, which is horrible for kids health. If we implement our model, kids will be given a bunch of fun, productive tasks to complete.

So kids won't be finding themselves so bored and also reaching for the screen. They can be doing cooking, science experiments, reading, and a whole bunch of fun physical challenges. To get kids moving and active, kids will be spending less time on screens because they are given fun, learning activities to do.

They will be more active during doing physical challenges and being up and doing all these tasks. This will improve kids' mental health because they are having fun and being productive. And they will sleep better, and they will be more active, spending less time on screens.

And during the holidays, much of the school sports is off and that extracurricular activities is off. And so just imagine how bad they will be for their physical health, especially if they're very sporty kids and they have a very active routine. And if they just randomly stop, that's not really good for physical health.

And as well just physical health, when kids do 20 minutes of exercising each day, which I know most kids don't, it gives them this endorphins, that's what it's called, which affects their mental health so much because they feel good about themselves. And just in general, it's just a good time. And I think I'm finished. Thank you.

ZALI BLACK: Please welcome our second speaker for the negative, Nina.

The other team said that this change would prepare them for high school, but we have two reasons why this is wrong. Firstly, at high school, there is no homework during the holidays and only on weekdays. And most primary schools have homework during the week, like in high school. And we are pretty sure that will prepare them enough for their homework load in high school.

And secondly, for the work that they are given during class, there are so many other things that can prepare them for high school, like orientation days. And most of the time, during the first week or so of high school, the teachers start a routine and step them through how the high school will work for the students who are confused.

Also, at primary school, in the later years like 5 and 6, most of the teachers, the work that they are giving is based on preparing them to move up to high school in the next year. That's why that point was wrong. The other team also said that they can use up their free time in holidays.

We have two reasons why this is wrong. The holidays are a break from learning, as my first speaker has already explained. And when children have free time in holidays, they will almost always find something to do other than having to do work.

So this change is obviously useless because the work wouldn't be used to the full extent. That's why that point was wrong. The other team said that this would be easier for parents. We have two reasons why this is wrong.

Even if for some parents, this change will benefit them, there will always be a group of students who are nagging their parents to force them help to answer a question, or to do an activity with them, or to help them cook and film something for the class and endless things that they think that they need their parents helpful. That's why that point was wrong.

Now to my case. Reports, meetings, parent teacher interviews, planning lessons, making sure every student is organised and ready for learning, caring for not only themselves, but their family, their students, the school, teaching, engaging, and helpful lessons. Teachers already have so much to do, let alone having to plan load a whole extra load of homework for their class to do during the holidays.

Right now, teachers are spending their holidays stress free and having a well-deserved break. They can take time to work on themselves, and they don't have to worry about teaching students or planning any lessons. Now imagine this rule has come into place and teachers now cannot spend time taking care of themselves and having a break because they're busy planning homework for the students. The teachers will be so stressed as they have to spend most of their break and holidays catering to students learning levels and giving everyone homework to complete over the holidays.

For example, if a primary school teacher is forced to plan around 30 different worksheets for every weekday of the holidays that would at least take an hour for every student to complete during the teacher's break, when they're supposed to be relaxing, this change will just stress them out, and their workload will double in size, meaning that when they come back to school, they are not stress free or prepared. And it feels like they never even had a holiday or a break.

That's important because teachers do so much for us already. And we should be celebrating their efforts and giving them a break instead of making them give more work to students. That's why we should not give students 5 hours of homework to complete every week over the holidays.

Think about the lockdown across New South Wales. Kids were stuck at home with work that was set by the teacher each day. Now think about how many kids actually completed that work and actually learnt things.

If this change came into place, it would be useless because if kids were stuck at home and had nothing to do other than schoolwork and didn't get much done, now how will kids be motivated to sit down and complete their work, when they have endless opportunities to have fun doing other things? Right now, kids are spending their time in the holidays having fun, hanging out with friends, preparing for the year ahead, spending time with loved ones, and so much more.

When students have all these other opportunities for them to enjoy their break, but on the other hand, they can do some homework instead. Which option do you think they'll choose? Now imagine this change has come into place and the teacher is wasting so much time and effort on setting homework for all different levels of the kids in their class when most of these kids will not even do it.

For example, think of the many unenthusiastic students you will get if you force kids to do equal, up to almost a whole school day, each week during their school holidays. But then again, these kids won't even do it. Most of them will completely forget about it and instead do other fun things that an enjoyable holiday has to offer.

This is important because there is no point for teachers to set this work when most kids won't even be doing it, and they'll just be wasting their time. That's why primary school students shouldn't do at least 5 hours of homework each week in the holidays. Thank you.

ABBY PETERSON-HAMPSHIRE: So as the affirmative team, we thought that there were three main issues in this debate. So first, how will this affect kids in terms of enjoying their holidays; second, how is our model going to affect teachers; and thirdly, is this going to be preparing kids for going back to school and then going to high school.

So our first issue, how will this affect kids in terms of enjoying their holidays. So the negative team is saying that kids aren't going to want to do all the work because it's just like maths and English. But as we said in our definition, this is going to be a whole bunch of fun activities, things that where they're still learning, but they're heaps of fun. So things like science experiments, art activities, reading, all things like that that are lots of fun, and kids are actually being productive instead of spending all their day on their screens and things like that.

But they are still learning, and then we also will have some form of revision. But it's mostly just going to be things like fun physical activities and things like that that still get kids learning, but they are still fun. OK. So they said that-- oh, and also, like we said in our definition, kids are actually going to be creating this matrix that they can get their activities off in the final 1 or 2 weeks of school.

And so they're going to be adding in-- I hope they're going to be having an input into this, which means they're likely to be a lot more interested in what they're doing. OK. So they said that kids are spending all their time with family and friends and doing fun things. Let's be honest, most of the time, kids are spending hours on their screens, watching TV, playing video games. And parents are trying to nag the kids, and they're telling them to get off their screens.

By doing this, we're giving kids the an opportunity to do a whole bunch of fun activities, such as science experiments and physical challenges that they can do with friends or by themselves. And parents will be so much happier that they're doing this. And instead of just-- if they're doing 2 hours on-- kids are at least having, during the holidays, 2 hours of screen time a day playing video games and stuff.

They would just take one hour out of that to do something, do some cooking, do some reading, doing something productive like that that's actually going to help them learn. OK. So they said that kids aren't going to have time to do this.

Like I just said, if kids are spending so much time doing things that are unproductive and just being bored and things like that, if they just take this one hour to do something like reading. You can easily do half an hour of reading and things like that. Or you can do you could even take up an hour doing a recipe where you're learning maths and things like that.

That's not going to be too hard. So they said that parents will be under stress, but parents actually want their kids to be doing things during the holidays. They get annoyed because their kids aren't doing anything, and they're just spending all the time on their screens.

So second issue, how will our model affect teachers. So the negative team is saying that teachers are going to be spending all their time planning and all that sort of thing. Like we said in our definition, what's going to be happening is the kids and their teachers are going to be working together on the last 1 or 2 weeks of school as an activity to create a matrix with all these different activities that kids can complete.

That will all be completed. The teachers don't have to set anything during the holidays. They'll just be sending home the matrix as well as some worksheets that are usually used up during the year that we get given in class anyway as revision and things like that.

So the teachers aren't actually having to do any extra work during the holidays apart from maybe once a week having a look through the pictures and videos that kids have sent to them about the work that they've been doing. OK. So they said that teachers are actually spending their whole-- on to my next issue.

So my third issue, they said that kids will be more-- so that will kids be more prepared for going back to school. So they said that kids won't remember the work that we're doing during the holidays. Well, what do you think is going to happen if kids are spending 6 weeks without doing any form of work at all or spending 2 weeks?

If they've done nothing, we all know kids come back to school and they're just like, I don't know how to do this. I did this last term. I did this last year. I have no idea what's going.

If they get some revision papers and they're able to do that during learning from home, and they're able to do these productive things like cooking, doing these physical challenges and things like that that incorporate all of our maths concepts and things like that, they're going to be so much prepared because they haven't completely forgotten what a fraction, what anything like that is.

And they'll be encouraged to read and do things like that, which is great for their English and things like that. It's not all just going to be like boring maths and English and things like that. It's going to be these fun activities that incorporate as well as some revision that will be easy to fit in.

And because kids are having all this time doing like fun stuff, we're like, oh, yeah, that's not too hard to do this page or something. So I don't forget it. And I come back to school, and I don't even know it.

So they said the kids will like leave it all to the end. And these are fun activities that kids are going to enjoy. Kids are spending like so much of their time on screens, spending time just being bored and not knowing what to do.

If we're giving them these fun activities, like science experiments, physical challenges, reading and things like that, they're going to want to do it. And things like that, cooking, it's heaps of fun. It's giving them the inspiration and the opportunity to do these sorts of things.

So they actually said, the opposition said that high schools don't have assignments, so this isn't going to prepare you during the holidays. High schools do have assignments during the holidays, and that's something that kids do not need to get used to actually be doing something productive during the holidays instead of just spending all your hours just playing video games and things like that. They actually need to get used to doing some form of productivity during that time.

So they said that kids, they can just do orientation things like that. Doing an orientation lesson, that's not going to be preparing you to be doing an assignment during the holidays. That has nothing to do with that.

So they said that kids won't want to do the work because it's boring. But like we keep saying, it's going to be this fun work the kids are going to want to do. But it still gets them ready to be coming back into the classroom and be switched on and that kind of thing. OK.

SOPHIE SEMETKA: All right. I think it's here.

ZALI BLACK: Please welcome our third speaker for the negative, Annabelle.

ANNABELLE BROWN: We have clearly convinced you why it's not beneficial to students' education and why it's an extra workload for teachers and why students will react negatively towards it. So now I will point out some obvious flaws in the other team's case.

The other team said it would get kids ready to learn for the next time or year. But we have many reasons why that is clearly wrong. As we've already stated multiple times, kids will obviously be stressed and worried about finishing their work, as they will probably forget about doing it straight away. And then by the time it comes to the end of the term, they'll suddenly realise they have so much homework to catch up on and will either rush it and hand in poorly and bad work or just not get it done.

And they will also not learn anything because they're rushing. And no kid wants to do work on the holidays, when they could be spending time outside playing games of soccer with their friends, not being inside on technology. They could be having playdates or catching up with their family.

Two, let's be honest, it is so hard for a teacher to even teach a 5-year-old how to read or write and then you expect that 5-year-old to do all that stuff on their own in the holidays without a teacher there to help them? How are they supposed to learn that? And two, a 5-year-old is not going to benefit from this work when they don't have someone to teach them.

They need that teacher to explain it in detail really easily and simply so they can understand it. The other team said that students need structure. But as my first speaker said, it won't give them a structure. Kids will not enjoy the work.

They will avoid it and spend time at the beach with friends or doing fun things, as we've already stated. Two, holidays aren't for structure. They're meant to be for fun, to go shopping, to go do fun things with your friends, not to be stuck in your room or in your house doing boring stuff.

You're not meant to do that. You're meant to be having fun and relaxing. The other team stated that the work won't just be maths and English. Most kids don't want to do this work and can always get endorphins and spend out time doing stuff with friends.

And two, families might not have the equipment or appliances to actually do this. Or they might not be able to get the ingredients for, say, the science experiment where you need hydrogen peroxide. They might not be able to source that because they don't know where to get it from. And families might not have a microwave if, say, you need to use something for their cooking.

The other team said it prepares you for high school. But we have two reasons why that is clearly wrong. You said in your definition that all kids would be doing this from kindergarten to Year 6.

But kids in younger years don't need to prepare for high school if they're in kindergarten, and they're probably too young to, as I already stated, to use those chemicals in the science to be able to cook using an oven and stuff. That probably too young and could seriously hurt themselves.

Three, they've orientation days and also prepared by homework after school, not during the school holidays. Because once they finish year 6, that holiday is meant to be a break to forget about primary school, move on, and prepare yourself for when you go to a big change-- high school.

They also said that doing physical activity, cooking, et cetera and a small portion of revision will prepare them for high school. How will this change, as you said, prepare them for high school if you're proposing that will be mostly being non-academic things that is nothing compared to the workload in high school.

Seriously, how can you compare doing cooking to the amount of assignments they get during this term? The other team stated that it's easier for parents, but we have two reasons why that is clearly wrong. Kids can always spend time with other family members or have playdates at their friend's house so that the parents don't have to put up with them for the whole day and can go to work.

Or what about school holiday programs, where they can go and do fun things like watch a movie with all their friends at their school? And two, if they're doing those sciences and cooking things, as you stated, they will need supervision and definitely will need help, like turning on the oven, mixing ingredients for science. If they're going outside and going to the park to kick a soccer ball for a physical activity, they'll need supervision. You can't trust an 8-year-old to go out on their own with no one watching them.

The other team stated that would use up kids' free time. Kids would much rather spend their free time with their family and friends, especially if they don't see them often. What about people that only come up for Christmas, like your family relatives that you don't see? Instead of wasting that time on doing the homework that's not going to benefit you at all, you're going to be spending that quality time with them.

And two, let's be honest. These kids are really young-- 5 to 6. If a kid in this age range finds out they have to do work on the holiday, they are obviously not going to do it. In fact, they're most likely to chuck a tantrum, to be honest.

So if kids are addicted to a screen, how much is the last thing that's going to motivate them? Obviously, rather go to the beach or spend time with friends, that would motivate them off the screen.

Now to my team's case. My first speaker clearly convinced you with it's a break from learning, and it's just some fun. And two, there's no point doing it as kids won't remember. They'll leave it to the end and get really stressed out, meaning that they might not finish it or hand them poor and bad work.

And my second speaker then followed that up with that kids won't even do the word. Look how lockdown was. No one learned anything from that.

So if a kid has fun opportunities to do stuff, they're not going to learn from that either. And two, it just adds to the teachers workloads. We already know how stressed the teachers are and how much we give them under credit than they need. We should just not do this change and leave it better for them. That is why primary school students shouldn't do at least 5 hours of homework every week of the school holidays.

ANNA-SOPHIA ZAHAR: Hi, everyone. First of all, I just want to say congratulations on what was an extremely high quality debate. The panel were absolutely blown away by every single one of you. You did an incredible job, and you should all be really proud of yourselves.

And I'm sure your teachers are, and we definitely all are of you. Just coming this far is such an achievement as well. So the way this is going to work is I'll quickly give some pieces of general feedback, then I'll run through the reasons for our decision. And at the end, I'll hold you in a bit of suspense, but I'll give the decision.

So first of all, something we thought that was done extremely well in this debate was every team did a really good job at rebuttal. We think their skills here were absolutely excellent. And every single speaker had a good amount of rebuttal in their speech, and this rebuttal was in-depth and well explained.

We think that areas that both teams could improve on, firstly, when you have a characterisation or you paint a picture of how the stakeholders in the debate will act and that characterisation is different to the one the other team gives, it's important to explain why yours is more likely, not to say that it is definitely true. So give reasons for that just like you would give for an actual argument.

The second piece of feedback we had was that once you have given reasons why your characterisation is more likely, take the other team at their best case. Say, even if it is true that the only people in this debate are 5-year-olds who will not be able to learn without a teacher there, why do we still win or why is this still OK for us? So we want to take them at their best and then win the debate from that, which means that we've absolutely clearly won.

So we thought this was a stakeholder debate, so I'll be splitting this explanation up into the three main stakeholders, which were kids, teachers, and parents. Firstly, looking at kids, we thought there were three things to consider here-- their well-being, their education, and their physical health.

Let's first look at their well-being. So we thought that while it was true that affirmative was correct, you could be benefited from your learning, at the end of the day, you are probably still forced into this as negative tells you and you don't have a choice. What that means is that for a lot of kids, we believe that it was true that it could build up and be stressful because there was no way of guaranteeing they would all do it at the right time, that they would necessarily enjoy all the tasks.

The affirmative team does a good job to point out that this is useful because, otherwise, they might be more stressed at the beginning of school. But I think the negative team point out that there are other methods to prevent this. For example, revision sessions and orientation for when they start high school.

The affirmative team further than say that this adds structure to your holidays, which I think is a really good argument. But I think the benefits could have been explained a little bit more and be made to seem more important. So what even is structure? Why do we really care about it?

And I think that's particularly true because the negative team shows that the structure probably doesn't really matter because the holiday is about relaxing and not about structure. And it also is contingent or this argument relies upon the fact that kids will do the work on time and have this structure, which is really up to them.

So I think at the end of this, the negative team is able to show that this might be more stressful because a lot of kids don't have the time to relax. They might not enjoy these tasks, and it also means they can't do other things, which are good for their well-being, for example, seeing their relatives and family and going on playdates and so on.

Secondly then, let's look at education. So it seems at the end of this area in the debate, that teachers would probably not be helping you learn all the time or to the extent that they were always there and always able to be helping you that probably was a little bit bad for teachers. But we'll look at that in a second.

So what that probably meant because neither team proves to us why if teachers will never be there versus if they'll always be there to give feedback all the time that they sometimes would and they sometimes wouldn't. So that meant that you would probably-- so we bought the argument from the negative team that you might be rushed and a bit stressed, you might not do this all at once.

And that also, for a lot of kids, it would be really hard to learn because you don't have a teacher there teaching, you particularly younger kids. So I think affirmative teams do an excellent job here to say that kids need to get used to being productive in the holidays. And I think this is a really good point, but it didn't-- we weren't sure how it was super important, considering that a lot of the time they wouldn't have work in the holidays anyway unless you did implement this policy.

But that being said, this wasn't really responded to properly by the negative team. So at the end of this, we thought that some people might learn. Some people might do the work, and it might be beneficial for their educations. But some people wouldn't. But the difference was that pretty much no younger people would do this work because they didn't have teachers there. And I think we were convinced by the negative team that was true.

So what this meant it was unclear whether there was a benefit to education-- sorry, there probably wasn't a benefit to education, but perhaps some students will do it. But it is also true that, as the negative said, perhaps they would be less likely to do work. So they would feel burnt out when they went to school.

So the benefits to education I think are a bit unclear. But we marginally gave this to the negative team because we thought they were able to prove that a lot of students will not do this, and the ones they do will probably not do as well when they go back to school.

So finally then looking at physical health. I think, and the whole panel, thought that affirmative team did really, really excellently here by saying why you could do better at-- sorry, why are you now we're more encouraged to physical health when you couldn't do it during school time. But again, I think this argument struggles a little bit because the negative teams gives us reasons why kids are unlikely to do it or at least to some extent convince us that lots of kids will just not do this exercise.

So the benefit of this is a lot smaller. There is also a little bit unclear on what side kids are on screens more or outside more. For example, you having to do at tasks and homework versus being on technology. So the whole panel thought that this argument was a bit unclear, and we were unable to award it to either team.

OK. So at the end of this argument, on the most important stakeholder, kids, we gave it marginally to the negative team because we thought they were able to prove that kids would likely be a little bit more stressed, and there was probably no benefit to education. Secondly now looking at teachers.

So with regards to teachers, the panel thought that either your teachers were very involved, and you learnt a lot, or they weren't involved and you probably didn't learn. So the most likely explanation was something in the middle where they were somewhat involved, and you perhaps learnt some things.

But what that meant, and I think the negative team did a really good job here to prove, that teachers really were not able to get rest or relaxation because they always had-- oh, sorry, they had extra work to do, they had extra things to mark. And although I think the affirmative change does a good job to say that perhaps writing the lesson plan wouldn't be that hard, particularly because kids themselves can get involved in it, which I think was clever, it was true that they would have to spend a lot more time walking and a lot less time in the holidays relaxing.

So it seemed like this is probably worse for teachers on the whole, and we gave this issue to the negative team. Finally then, looking at parents, it was unclear here if parents would necessarily be more or less stressed because it was unclear whether they'd be more stressed by having to help their kids with their homework tasks or perhaps less stress because now kids have something to do with themselves, and they don't have to look after them.

And I think here, particularly teams needed to explain why their characterisation was the more likely one. So again, we did not award this issue-- sorry, we didn't award this or this issue of the stakeholder of parents to either team. So at the end of this, we gave this debate in a unanimous decision. So all three of us voted for the negative team.

So congratulations to the negative team. That was because we thought they were able to prove that this was better for teachers, because it was less stressful for students and because there was probably no benefit to education that resulted. But congratulations to both sides. You all did an incredible job, and you should be really proud of yourselves.

And the panel has lots and lots of feedback, if you would like it. But I hope you guys can enjoy the rest of your debating careers. Well done. We're super proud of you.

TONY DAVEY: Thanks, Anna-Sophia. And I'll just add my congratulations again to both teams on a super close, super excellent debate. All right. So unfortunately, it's my job now to call on a representative of the unlucky state finalists Terrigal, who've still done themselves ridiculously proud to congratulate 2021 Champs from Bangalow Public School.

BETHANY JOHNSTON: Congratulations on the amazing debate, Bangalow Public School. You're a really great team. Congratulations on your win today. I would also like to thank the adjudicators for their time. Have a great holiday.

TONY DAVEY: Thanks, Terrigal. That's amazing, dude. Thank you, Terrigal. That's spectacular. We'll played.

And, of course, I'll call upon a representative of our 2021 champs to respond.

JUNE LESLIE: Thanks for debating us. You guys did really well, and we really enjoyed it. And it's still a really big achievement that you guys made it into the finals, and we wish you the best for the future. Also, thank you for the educators.

TONY DAVEY: I'm sure it was their pleasure. And I'm not going to try to do anything more with this trophy than just kind of point at it and say, I hereby award this trophy to our 2021 State Champions from Bangalow Public School. If you could give them one last round of applause. Well played, Bangalow.