IB SKILLS AND PRACTICE Theory of Knowledge at) Sista ee eeu Tate) Teenie Oo Jill Rutherford ean igOXFORD URIVERSIFY PRESS (Gea Earn ier ed GP ued Unies Pes se departs oce Unless of Oxf. 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"Tete Ws x7 a Yd “Ea. wd “ee Nowre “ego brperauen ofA at Uns Mee tit "De Rok Fe le ra gee in Bel re Tn neon 08 oped by rseiaba a Mela depen ‘pena Netcom ats Mose eas Cot tt os Do AMER 108301, y proc af ABE Tew Pras ‘tegen Phere aula H emf Lng al Mn le {Hews tobecpgrp sewn Meee fot, prbtad bppecens a gun ce Maclin Yon hela peated {pat Berntsen sta gio were pare ye berth preety pein or hengum hots i tim aunt Taney fei etna Tom ayart tie Pra, ay cori W 121s Peano od Plime icvard Cag, Feprtng by peibn ofthe plc ‘um Waker “Daarenjrs ete on ofthe wo, Te nett 11 ana. agent @ The neaeaon 2, opine ye emson of ESL eit Inet |sx.aogh we ne ade ete ee tac am caa 8 copa ere ‘Sere usta hr acne pasuhe malas taeda ote il vty ey ores a wns eis opp ‘Ay hin party mie chee exacts cme oft etna gob ‘Sed teaveace panic the ippy Serpe me cape ere tet [a ech ee fr pennContents Section 4: Introduction What is this heck for? 3 What is knowledge? . soutien . ? What TOK can da for you | - - 16 What da you haveto de For TOK? 18 Section 2: TOK terms and skills Introduction; the Think TUK’ process . 23 Realife situations . cs . . . a4 Knowledge claims . 30 ‘Shared and personal knowledge. 34 Knowledge frameworks az Knowledge questions _ 48 Section 3: Applying TOK skills Application of the Think TOK pracess |. sa Topics: 4. Faith healing 60 2. Poetry as history ons BR 3. Taboos . 64 4. Memory and food 66 5. Genetic enginecring and ethics ce ‘6, Motherhood 70 Section 4: Towards assessment Assessmentrequirements . octet PB TOK essays 74 TOK presentations, 89 Section 5: Big ideas summary of some big ideas and people that have shaped our world. This section will give you astarting peint from which you can launch your own teading and research, a5 Section 6: TOKOPOLIS — the game of taming TOK IFTOK is too abstract for you, at the end of this book youll find a TOK cenatio gore ta play, to make TOK and its terminology more real . 146 i ]Pet CLTSECTION 1 IntroductionWhat is this book for? ‘Theory of knawledge [TOK] is a great subject, but i's onethatcan feel complicated, oreven a bit scary, t doesn't need to be this way — and that’ why we've written this book, Provided that you appeaach it in the right way, TOK can actually be quite straightfonvard, and ence you've got the hangef haw to think TOK’, then it really can improve yaur fe, helping {you to think more critically and clearly about the world around you, ‘The purpose ofthis books to show you howta get the most out ofTOK. Wie've cut down-en jargon, stripping TOK back ta its fascinating essentials, We've also written with assessment in mind- our goal hasbeen to make this book 3 too! that can help ang 8 Diploma student (or their teacher) ‘with preparation far the presentatinn and essay.‘he authars ofthis book are current ar former TOK teachers with lang experience of how this unique subject canbe approached in a variety of schools across the world. Ne have written in the light of aur experience, and we've tested what weve written in aur own lessons, We know what works, and what deesn't Everything in this, book could havea place on a wellsesigned TOK course, Ourexperience is practical, and that's why we've written this practical guide: I's what we knowthe most about. We must alsn emphasize wha we're nat, We're not If officials, we didn't write the subject guide, and we didn’t invert those famous TOK acron yns, This book is nat prescriptive, and you shouldn't think that just because welve included something [armissed something out], then this isa sign that it must formust not) be taught, However, we have spent alotef time thinking about the subject guide [first assessment 2015, available in the Gnline Curiculum Centre] and abnut how its new features and terms (like knowtedge frameworks] could play a part in TOK lessons. n essence, this is a guide on ‘How to think TOK Who is this book for? This book is for anyone invelved in TOK — students or teachers ~ who wants a new take-an how te approach the subject, We remember how intimidating TOK can feel as a new student [orteacher], and our main aim isto remave this fearfor anyone approaching the subject forthe first time, of anyone who feels apprehensive about ‘TOK. We want you to approach the two assessment tasks with confidence, and the skills we discuss in the pages of this book should enable you te do just that,[| What TOK is TOK teaches yau how to think, You don't have to know anythingin particular to be good at TOK, Unlike in any other subject there's no list of facts or formulae that you need ta memorize. Te geta goad TOK grade, all you need to do isto show that you are able to think. (Of curse, in TOK you need te show you can think in a particular way — there are na marks available fer showing that you can camplete-crosswards in record time, for example, c for showing that you are a whizz at chess. The thinking you learn in TOKis how to analyse tricky questions shout Knowledge ~ questions that cauld crop up in any of your other 18 Diploma subjects, areven in the real world These questions, which cauld range fiom samething rather abstract like How do we know when to trust cur intuition? te the mere concrete, ike "How da we know when ta trust eyewitness accounts of an event?’ are at the heart of 10K, They're called knowledge questions, and showing that you kno»rhow to answerthem critically and objectively is the skill which underpins TOK. TOK students are always asking ‘How de you know that?’ By the end of yaur TOK course, you should understand that knowledge is rarely as certain asit first seems, and that we come to know things ina variety ef ways —the sheer number of which might surprise you. Answering knowledge questions ~a process which always begins with the further question How da you know that?’ - should turn you into 2 reflective, analytical student who takes nothing for granted, . its a_httle Ir eould | Doctor, Ive You pon fag nel be LHS, get o Fedling, they, elf fuk I's a a Live Hamey ind alt rire ity Syndrome. about it. iserder Mean i be BS painlessly Se eine ed 2 les affecting And tell No | anf ayes Theyed "Ye, do you ad | dont heleve Tat it developed 4 sad, belveve inthe (n Kylie or the ape disillusioned, exiled, 47 294F — great ’global premise Sourt abandoned, leak . terror ? or Phe boom ecohemny ver of suerte ar LHS..| maj jor Vents ar Petkbuct rade om apie pal : Leung What TOK is nat TOKis not philosephy. Its not epistemalogy even though, for philasaphers, this might seem perplexing and itsdifferent from any other subject taught in school today. t's worth emphasizing again that you don't need to know-anything in particular to be a good TOK student: all the essay and presentation mark schemes. Wait you to do isto show that you ¢ah think about knowledge. What knowledge you think about, precisely, iS not the crucial factor when yaur TOK essay is marked. TOK is designed to get you to reflect on what youve beamed elsewhere.What's in this book? Some TOK teachers argue that, Because you dan't need to know any specific ‘content for TOK, then textbooks are a waste ‘of time, We see what they mean, but we disagree, What we've tried to do-with this bookiis te include pointers that will help you reflect an what you already know, plus lots af advice on getting the highest marks possible in your presentation and far your essay. We have organized this book into the follawing sections: foe ny Poorer ei Section 2 — TOK terms and skills ‘This section sets out the fundamentals of TOK — ‘the key terms and how ta start thinking about Colour coding and icons used in this book: These activities may be fara group or an individual assignment. They will help you put your TOK skills into practice, These are statements that make assertions ta truth. Claims that are made about knowledge as oppased to subject-specific content. Knowledge questians are questions about the nature of knowledge. ‘Accontemporary situation or tesue which is local and/or global ara personal experience thathas the potential to be controversial knowledge questions, nether words, this ‘section should give you the tacks to think TOK”. Section 3 - Applying TOK skills Here, we give you some examples of realife situations that you could think about using. ‘the tools provided in Section 2, Thrdughout Section 5, we include lots of suggestions for further research on websites, in books and other media This iron points out Think TOK questions. These aren't knowledge questions, but you can use them as starting points for class discussion, written tasks, oryour ownresearch, Section 4 - Towards assessment In this section, we look:in-depth at the essay and the presentation, guiding you through the sametimes complicated pracess of using TOK forthe work which ‘villeontibute to your final mark Section 5 - Bigideas Here we get abit philosophical, giving you a rundown ‘on what some of the biggest thinkers in history have had to say about the issues TOK students face in ‘every lesson. We've done this because we think it's interestingta see what other people have thaught about these questions, not because you need to learn ‘what they had to say! Abbreviations used in this book: ‘The bigideas in Section Sare complemented by the | Area af knowledge ADK “Big questions’ that appear throughout the book. Rater cress WOK TOKOPOLIS Knowledge claim Ke TOK still seems a bit abstract, this is a game for Knowledge question ko {you to try, I allows. you to take TOK scenaries and to Knowledge framework | KF discuss them using physical representations ofthe | eai.ife situation aa verms. it makes TOK less abstract.and might help you understand it better Theery of knowledge TokKnowledge is semething that helps us to make sense of the world around us, In TOK, there ate eight types of knowledge or areas af knowledge [ADK] and each of these helps us to understand a diferent partofthe world Each area af knowledge is useful to us in a different way. History, for example, is an area of knowledge that helps us to understand things that happened in the past. Natural science helps us to understand the laws of nature. Ethics helps us to understand tricky questions of right and wrong, Jand so on, It's useful to think of each area of knowledge as.a map, with each of them giving a different description of the word, Just as we'd usea map of the world ifwe wanted to sail arcund the globe, we'd use the map! af knowledge pravided by maths if we wanted to understand algebra In the same way, if we wanted to find the-right way fram one side af town tothe other we'd use a town plan, just as if we wanted to understand the paintings of Rembrandt, we'd use the map provided to us by the area of knowledge known as the arts. This is why we split knowledge up into eight areas in TOK: it would be a waste of time ta plat a journey around the warid using a map of a-small town, $0 it would be fruitless to try to find out about the Battle of Warerloo 9 1815 using the map provided by religious knowledge systems, doe helps us to navigate and undeThe areas of knowledge ‘Areas of knowledge [AOKs) are the branches of ‘knowledge, each having its ewn distinct methods and nature. FFor the TOK course, you should study atleast sicof thesesight ADK: 1 mathematics, ethics i thenaturalsciences religious knowledge Mi thehuman sciences systems © theans | indigenous knawledge © history systems. How to think about the areas of knowledge ‘There is an IB-approved [and also very useful] way af thinking about each area of knowledge, called the knowledge framework [KF]. Each area of knowledge hhas an ‘official framewark that goes with it, and each framework describes hew each area can be explared, ‘The idea is that once you havea grasp of the ideas, inthe framework, you'll be able te ask [and answer] knewledge questions, We talk about knowledge frameworks in more detail in ‘Section 2, and there's a full description of them in the ‘TOK subject guide, published by the IB,