More on oral assessments

Following on this exchange on oral assessments: My Civil Rights class this semester (first meeting this morning) will not include a large end-of-semester writing project, only oral arguments (plus three short in-semester papers and class participation). The three papers are worth more than the arguments, as school rules require. But students can focus all attention to the arguments as the capstone to the class.

I am curious to see if it makes a difference in the quality of arguments or in my ability to evaluate overall performance.