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Interesting, how do you motivate the kids to want to learn?
Reading fiction hardly seems pointless, compared to other pursuits a parent might push a child into. It develops vocabulary and reading comprehension (helpful when you later want to read non-fiction), general knowledge and social abilities, and can lead to other interests. I got interested in crypto and the Singularity from reading Vernor Vinge, and philosophy in part from reading Greg Egan.
It seems like boredom as a strategy requires a lot of time and patience, even when it succeeds. I wasn't that serious about programming (despite learning the basics as a kid) until I got into crypto and decided that writing an open source crypto library would be a good way to help push towards a positive Singularity, and that only happened in college after I read Vinge's A Fire Upon the Deep.
Your verbal abilities don't seem low to me (at least in writing). Maybe low compared to Eliezer, but then he is just off the charts.
I'm worried that competitive debating trains for the wrong things (e.g., using arguments as soldiers). ChristianKl's suggestion of drama lessons doesn't seem like it would increase verbal abilities more than say reading, but I'd be interested if anyone has evidence to offer about that. I'll probably have to do some research to see what other activities are good for increasing verbal skills.
Drama lessons train the ability to act in a specific scripted way in a social situation.