BASICS OF
CUTTING GOOD
CARDS
WHY RESEARCH?
Research wins debates. It feels great to win on an
argument that you have written. You will understand it
really well, you will know exactly where all of the cards
are and you will be able to predict what the other team
will read against you. That level of preparation
translates into calm confidence that will win debates!
Researching is a responsibility of every team
member. You can always decline an assignment to
focus on school or family but consistently avoiding
work impacts your travel priority.
Research takes practice. There is a learning curve.
Over time, you will know what databases or searches
to use and what types of cards are the most useful. Do
not be surprised if you have trouble at first.
Regular work is the key to success. Get in the
habit of doing small amounts of debate work on a
regular schedule. You will feel prepared and will
generate an impressive amount of work. Even five
hours a week will really add up.
WHEN DO YOU NEED A CARD?
Your previous experience with research
was probably a teacher telling you that
you had to have X number of sources for
your grade. I want you to think about
WHY and WHEN you actually need a
source to support your arguments.
Arguments need support from expert
sources when we want to borrow
credibility that we do not have.
WHAT MAKES A SOURCE WORTH QUOTING?
Official qualifications
Experience in the field
Recent if the information
required may have
changed
High quality publisher
Information used in
context
Free from bias (having a
strong opinion is fine
though)
Supported by other
research
Unclear or poor
qualifications
Unclear author
Out-dated information
Blog or other random
internet source
Information warped to fit
your purpose
Someone who has an
incentive to misrepresent
the truth
Fringe opinion
TOP EXCUSES FOR HAVING A BAD SOURCE
Do NOT use these.
The web page looked/sounded really good.
The web page cited other people who look
qualified.
I know that there were qualifications but I
went back to find them and the web page
seemed to have shut down.
This source had a familiar name.
My dog ate my qualifications.
HOW TO FIND DECENT SOURCES
It depends on what you are looking for:
Current events: Lexis database (via library) or
Google News (which is awesome but also contains
some garbage)
In depth articles: Library databases, books
Ask librarians or Mrs. Heidt for help
Side note: You may NOT use Wikipediafun
general reading and often OK but not an
acceptable academic source. Consider yourself
warned. Similarly, you may not quote from emails or blogs written by debaters.
COMPUTERS!
Cards got their name because evidence used
to be cut out and pasted down in actual recipe
cards.
Then, debaters moved to cutting and pasting
onto paper briefs.
Now, we do everything electronically. All files
need to be placed into a Word document and
e-mailed in. If you find a passage in a book
that you need, either scan and OCR or type it
in. Why? It is much easier to edit blocks if
they are electronic.
We will also help you to create a Word
template that allows you to automatically
create block titles etc.
WHAT MAKE A GOOD CARD?
No factoids. Cut cards that have specific uses in
rounds, not random bits of information. Always ask
yourself how is this card going to be useful in the
round?
Quality is all that matters. Assume 2 things:
The other team will have a good card that says the
opposite and yours needs to be better.
The judge is calling for the card.
Fewer repetitive cards. No more than four pages of
the evidence making the same argument.
Never cut evidence that is out of context. If an
author later disagrees with the claim in a card that you
have cut from them, it is out of context. Ask yourself
would the author agree with this tag? Not the whole
position necessarily but the tag? If there is any
question, ask a coach, DO NOT turn it out to the team.
WHAT MAKE A GOOD CARD?
Recent evidence helps.
Never cut evidence off of a debate list-serve, a private
e-mail or a debate related blog. Some teams do this, it
is cheating and will hurt our reputation.
Qualified evidence is better. Staff writers are OK for
uniqueness evidence and maybe some other simple
claims but better qualified evidence wins more
debates.
Cut cards that are too long, not too short. Ways
to ensure that your evidence represents complete
ideas (and therefore arguments) include the following:
One sentence cards are useless because they have
no reasoning.
NEVER begin or cut off a card mid-sentence.
Do not cut cards that start with however or but.
Include the above paragraph or sentence so that
your evidence represents a complete idea.
CITATIONS
Complete and accurate.
Full name of the author, complete
date, qualifications (may need to
Google these), title of publication, page
number if available, cut and paste web
address, note database.
Format: Last name, date in BOLD (rest
in parenthesis).
ALWAYS collect cites as you go, never
plan to go back and get them later.
TAGGING
Use strong languageIf the author makes a good
argument, maximize the usefulness of the evidence
with a strongly worded tag. This is accomplished
by:
Avoiding vague words like good, equals, bad, or
very. Use more specific language. Very bad should be
replaced by 10 million deaths etc.
Never state a passive relationship between two things,
such as X and Y are both happening. Such passive
relationships are not useful in debate; re-tag it to say X
causes Y or X prevents, increases or decreases Y.
Stay away from debate jargon. A little is OK, especially
with affirmative DA answers, but tags that are more storyoriented will do more to catch the judges attention.
Do not over-tagFor instance, if your evidence
says a disease will impact 10% of the population, do
not tag the evidence to claim extinction.
Shorter tags are usually better.
COMPLETE FILES
Does your file represent a strategy?
Have you scouted other teams for
cites and arguments commonly made
against your file? Do you have those
issues covered?
Have you scouted other teams for
good cards that should be part of our
file?
BLOCKS
Make indexes easy to use. Indexes should have
clearly labeled sections. For example: a DA could be
organized into uniqueness, links, internal links,
impacts and answers to aff answers.
Remember the header. Imitate other varsity files.
Clear block titles.
Use a uniform font. Control-A (select all) is your
friend, Times New Roman 10 pt looks good. Tailor it a
little yourself if you like but make sure that it is
uniform and easy to read.
Underline ahead of time. Do not waste everyones
prep by making the whole squad underline when you
could do it once for everyone.
Organize the cards from best to worst. People
will naturally read what is on the top of the page so
put the best ones up there.
Eliminate extra returns. It saves paper and looks
nicer.
BLOCKS
Make sure that all of the cards on the
block fit under the block title. No random
cards stuck at the bottom please. If you
have evidence that is not even worth its own
title, throw it out.
Do not cut off cards in the middle unless
the card itself is more than 1 page long.
If you simply have multiple cards on a page, use a
page break to keep them intact.
If a card is a 2 page card, clearly write continues
on the bottom of page 1 and the top of page 2.
Also, put the cite again on the bottom of page 2
just in case you get things shuffled around.
SENDING IN FILES
Send files to a g-mail account. It will
be very handy because it can be
searched for content.
Title Word docs something obvious
like Wind 1AC so that you can find
it when you search. Print now or
Ellis rules will not be helpful when
someone wants the cards.