Education Dive – Lauren Barack 
Conversational speaking is a skill children learn, and master early. They do this without thinking when they’re together at lunch, passing in the halls and even on social media. Place them in the front of a classroom however, and the volume of their voice may fall, their hands flutter, and they may lose their conviction and their poise. Speech and debate skills, however, are at the core of U.S. history and even the nation’s founding documents. Neither the Declaration of Independence nor the Constitution could have been crafted, let alone delivered, without the drafters embodying confidence, critical thinking and the ability to create a persuasive argument. (more)