Leerlijn Debatteren: Modern en Inclusief Burgerschapsonderwijs in Vlaanderen en Nederland

Our main goal was to develop an accessible and high-quality debate curriculum that helps students improve their oracy, critical thinking, and citizenship skills. We aimed to create materials that ...

Our main goal was to develop an accessible and high-quality debate curriculum that helps students improve their oracy, critical thinking, and citizenship skills. We aimed to create materials that teachers can use independently, making debate education available to all students, regardless of their school’s resources. Additionally, we wanted to foster an inclusive debate culture by ensuring the curriculum is suitable for all educational levels. By working with a panel of teachers, we ensured the material aligns with classroom needs and national curricula. Finally, we aimed to promote knowledge exchange between teachers in the Netherlands and Flanders and provide a long-term, sustainable resource that supports debate education beyond the project’s duration.

We have developed a curriculum together with a panel of experts consisting of Dutch teachers from the Netherlands and Flanders who teach different ages and levels. To do so, we have organised several panel meetings to exchange ideas, experiences and best practices, and will test this material during pilot programs. The results of the pilots have been included in the final product, which is a reader consisting of lesson plans and videos that we have present during festive program launch ceremonies and during debate events.

The main output of our project is the Debate Curriculum, which includes a teacher’s guide, a student workbook, and educational videos. These materials provide structured lesson plans that help students develop debating skills and improve their oral communication, critical thinking, and citizenship competences. The curriculum is freely accessible and designed for all secondary school levels. Additionally, the project strengthened cross-border collaboration between teachers in the Netherlands and Flanders. Participating teachers exchanged best practices, tested the materials in their classrooms, and provided feedback to refine the final product. To ensure broad impact, we organized launch events, promoted the curriculum via social media, newsletters, and educational networks, and shared it on national and European platforms. The curriculum will remain freely available and continuously updated to support teachers and students beyond the project's duration.