Sports Psychology Classroom Debates

Questioner: We’re here with Malcolm and Kaiza, returning SportsChallenge athletes, and members of Sports Psychology 206. What were you guys up to in class today?

Malcolm: We were debating our opinions about certain topics, and whether or not it was inside or outside of our circle of control.

Kaiza: That’s the general idea of what we did.

Questioner: Can you give me an example of something you debated?

Kaiza: Luck! We debated whether or not luck was inside of our control. We got into a pretty heated debate, with a lot of good input from both sides.

Malcolm: Out of all the topics, luck was the most heated argument, and it brought out the most ideas from everybody.

Kaiza: A lot of different angles to approach it from.

Questioner: What were some other hotly debated topics?

Kaiza: Team chemistry. There were a lot similar to this that you could go both ways on – many where I had to have an internal debate first.

Questioner: Were you surprised by the debates?

Kaiza: Surprised by some of the rebuttals – people had interesting ways of tackling the prompt.

Questioner: what has been your biggest take away from classes so far

Malcolm: Honestly, I’ve made sure that based on the debates we’ve had, I’ve learned how to take in others opinions. …I can empathize how they feel about the situation, and compare to how I feel about the situation. It shows me how others think.

Kaiza: Similarly, it’s taught me how to be open minded, and not just to look at things from my point of view, but others.

Kids debate in their Sports Psychology Class about what is in their "Circle of Control"

Student-athletes also spent a lot of time discussing the fact that referee's calls are outside their circle of control; by recognizing that a referee call is outside their circle of control, the students supported the idea that they should not waste energy worrying about a bad call.

(Malcolm-Urban Dove, New York; Kaiza-California)