Important Note: The purpose of these debates are to challenge yourself to think about difficult topics in English, and expand your understanding on a topic. The purpose of these debates is not to ‘argue’ or ‘win’ the debate. The debate topics are not fixed, and depend on the students' personal interests, but may include topics such as 'low-fat vs low-carb diets', '(intermittent) fasting', 'best training protocols for atrophy', 'do you need to do compound lifts such as squats and deadlift to get strong?' etc. During the class, we will decide together 3-4 topics to debate about, in order, based on what the students have read in preparation. Then, we will start debating the first topic. One student will start with one argument, then I will give my response and ask one or two questions before opening it up to the rest of the students. From then, my primary task as host is to facilitate the debate and make sure we keep on that. After the 1st debate, we will move on to the 2nd. It’s unlikely that we will have time to do all 4, so that’s why it’s important that we order the debate topics at the beginning. Personally, I have been obsessed with nutrition and fitness since I was 14 years old. I reguarly listen to scientific podcasts on nutrition and fitness (such as the Huberman Lab Podcast), and have read many books and journals on these topics. As a result, now I very rarely read magazines such as "Men's Health" because I prefer more scientific sources.

This is an advanced class and students should already have a good grasp of the language and/or nutrition & fitness. Students will be challenged to use persuasive language to debate their point of view, practice ways to defend, support or oppose an idea in a respectful way in English, as well as hopefully learn something new about nutrition and fitness!