The following 6 day series of emails are primarily for current and future teachers of the Class of 2018. It is only an FYI for pre-IB teachers interested in what TOK is.
It has been decided (as required after the 5 year curriculum review by IB) that Theory of Knowledge (TOK) class will be taught in the second semester of a student’s junior year and in the first semester of the senior year. This process will begin in full with the Class of 2019 (that will start TOK class in January 2018). However for the class of 2018 what this means is they will only have essentially a one semester course (Fall 2017) of TOK.
What this means for you is that the school needs to make a better emphasis on “Teaching TOK Across the Curriculum” to reach IB’s 100 hour requirement for the course. Specifically this means you all should have greater awareness of the terms and methods/processes of TOK and begin to help in suggestions from your subject area for possible TOK Oral topics and examples that can be used in possible TOK essays (mostly seen in the final two images of this email).
Intro to TOK course overview:
Day 1 = TOK Intro/overview/tips
Day 2 = Intro to how you can help with TOK Orals (suggesting RLSs + KQs)
Day 3 = Samples of RLSs, first order KQs, second order KQs tied to the TOK Oral task
Day 4 = Intro to how you can help with TOK Essays (suggesting case studies, incidents, historical evidence, emerging paradigms)
Day 5 = Intro to Sample TOK Essays
Day 6 = Examiner-style grading of 3+ TOK Essays (good and bad ones & knowing the difference)
For Day 1, please explore:
What is TOK: http://www.ibo.org/en/programmes/diploma-programme/curriculum/theory-of-knowledge/what-is-tok/
& see the two attachments below
More information on TOK at Creek can be seen at: http://schstok.weebly.com/
Key Terms of TOK are mostly seen below but also include:
RLS = real life situations (tangible, concrete case studies, incidents, examples, evidence with a real world based who/what/when/where)
KQ = Knowledge Questions (best seen in May 2017 TOK essay prompts in the first image below. They are open-ended questions about knowledge that exist in the “TOK world” not the “real world”)
WOKs = ways of knowing
AOKs = areas of knowledge
It has been decided (as required after the 5 year curriculum review by IB) that Theory of Knowledge (TOK) class will be taught in the second semester of a student’s junior year and in the first semester of the senior year. This process will begin in full with the Class of 2019 (that will start TOK class in January 2018). However for the class of 2018 what this means is they will only have essentially a one semester course (Fall 2017) of TOK.
What this means for you is that the school needs to make a better emphasis on “Teaching TOK Across the Curriculum” to reach IB’s 100 hour requirement for the course. Specifically this means you all should have greater awareness of the terms and methods/processes of TOK and begin to help in suggestions from your subject area for possible TOK Oral topics and examples that can be used in possible TOK essays (mostly seen in the final two images of this email).
Intro to TOK course overview:
Day 1 = TOK Intro/overview/tips
Day 2 = Intro to how you can help with TOK Orals (suggesting RLSs + KQs)
Day 3 = Samples of RLSs, first order KQs, second order KQs tied to the TOK Oral task
Day 4 = Intro to how you can help with TOK Essays (suggesting case studies, incidents, historical evidence, emerging paradigms)
Day 5 = Intro to Sample TOK Essays
Day 6 = Examiner-style grading of 3+ TOK Essays (good and bad ones & knowing the difference)
For Day 1, please explore:
- This overall website & IB’s Intro to TOK videos (mostly for parents): http://d2sogmhdubry8r.cloudfront.net/TOKforParents-V2.2/story.html (mostly the Welcome to TOK & Understanding TOK segments)
What is TOK: http://www.ibo.org/en/programmes/diploma-programme/curriculum/theory-of-knowledge/what-is-tok/
& see the two attachments below
- IB’s TOK course guide: https://ibpublishing.ibo.org/server2/rest/app/tsm.xql?doc=d_0_tokxx_gui_1304_2_e&part=1&chapter=1&CFID=1046348&CFTOKEN=60446505&jsessionid=bc306d93a58054de8eb16a64705e3769144a
More information on TOK at Creek can be seen at: http://schstok.weebly.com/
Key Terms of TOK are mostly seen below but also include:
RLS = real life situations (tangible, concrete case studies, incidents, examples, evidence with a real world based who/what/when/where)
KQ = Knowledge Questions (best seen in May 2017 TOK essay prompts in the first image below. They are open-ended questions about knowledge that exist in the “TOK world” not the “real world”)
WOKs = ways of knowing
AOKs = areas of knowledge
For Day 2: Understanding KQs and RLSs for the TOK Oral & Helping us in suggesting RLSs to students from your subject area:
Most everything you need to know about the TOK Oral is seen in the first image below. It starts with an RLS (that requires a who/what/when/where real world tangible event/case) from which they extract their unique and single KQ. The majority of the 10 minute performance is in their analysis of that TOK KQ (below the dotted line in the image) as their KQ leads to additional KQs that may be subject specific or broad based and these KQs will likely lead them to reapply/recontextualize/retriangulate the issue of their KQ into other RLSs from around the world / other historical periods / other AOKs.
Samples of class of 2017 RLSs and their KQ are below the image.
We need your help in trying to suggest emerging issues, developing concerns amongst experts, shifts in protocols/methodologies, ethical dilemmas in your subject area from which a TOK Oral RLS might emerge. We also need your help in trying to frame your course specifics in a way that asks/raises broad based KQs. In other words, hopefully you have more in-class sentences like “This might make a good TOK Oral topic.” Or “This would work well as an example of X in a TOK essay”. Or step back from your content and say “The essential knowledge question this figure in our field is grappling with is X”.
2017 Creek examples of RLS to their KQ (may need to scroll over to see the KQs)
RLSKQ
Artist Jon Campbell sues department store Target for using/distrubuting his designs without permission after his fans notify him.How does one determine intellectual property and ownership among a knowledge community?
An article by The Guardian documented the rise of C-sections in India due to the financial gain for the doctors. The World Health Organization recommends that 10-15% of births should be done by C-sectionTo what extent is it the responsibility of humans to incorporate new knowledge into their behavior?
The University of Chicago has sent a letter to admitted students alerting them to the fact that the administration does not endorse the usage of "trigger warnings" and "safe spaces."Are conflicting viewpoints and opinions inherently detrimental to the production and application of knowledge?
the death of a Tesla customer that died while his Tesla was on auto-pilot mode.How can bias and rationality be overcome in the placement of blame?
The introduction of Burmese pythons in the Everglades due to release of pets (too big of a pet for owners control).What negative implications arise when humans influence the natural world and innately try to dominate it?
he addition of the Sedasys anesthesiology machine in the ProMedica Toledo Hospital in 2015. This personalized sedation system could reduce the need for anesthesiologistsTo what extent does pragmatic benefit outweigh potential drawbacks in the creation of technological advancements?
the existence of a conversational intelligence named Silvia that uses several different types of input in order to create ideas and responses. The existence of an artificial intelligence tWhat role do language and sense perception play in the recognition of the idea of consciousness?
the exploitation of Henrietta Lacks and will touch on animal experimentation and Harry Harlow separation experiments.When is it morally acceptable to sacrifice the needs of an individual in the name of science?
Tuskagee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male 1932-1972 was an experiment run by the U.S. Department of Health tHow can the use of unconsented human test subjects be justified in the pursuit of knowledge?
On Friday, February 24th, 2016, the White House blocked numerous new sources that President Donald Trump has previously accused of spreading “fake news” from a press briefing.Under what circumstances (if any) should the deliberate distortion or concealment of knowledge be permitted in a knowledge community?
In Vogue España, Kendall Jenner was given a photography spread that portrayed her as a dancer/ballerina. Many people, mostly dancers, were offended by this.Does art require prior knowledge in order for the audience to truly appreciate it?
Researches at Salk Institute of Biological Sciences successfully integrated human stem cells into pig embryos using CRISPR? Cas9 gene editing tShould ethical considerations overrule the pursuit of knowledge in experimental areas of knowledge?
The "Pilot" (smart ear piece language translator). The product allows two people to communicate using two completely different languages and still completely understand each other.In what ways can technology break barriers and bridge together knowledge communities?
Music therapy: San Jose State University study completed in 2009 by Elizabeth Ron Fang. It is entitled, "Music in the Lives of Two Children with Autism".By what standards can one quantify knowledge as beneficial (to society)?
Dark/Deep Web: DARPA, however, wants to create a search engine capable of extracting information from these sources in order to identify illegal activity and thwart incoming threats before they have a chance to occur.What implications arise in the regulation of informative mediums upon the distribution of knowledge?
Dr. James Andrews belief in how we are overusing the Tommy John surgery on the youngHow can experts limit the overreaching/ obsessive necessities of the general population?
New McGraw-Hill US history textbooks introduced to the Texas curriculum are accused of blatant bias, since they change wording and gloss over some events to make the United States look better.Is it possible to transmit historical knowledge objectively?
Amazon sells The Hoax of the Twentieth Century - The case against the presumed extermination of European Jewry. This book makes dubious knowledge easily accessible to the publicOn what grounds could dubious knowledge be beneficial to the knower?
Seaworld's Shamu shows were branded as an "educational" experience, but it grew more entertainment based,Can entertainment and the gaining of knowledge be mentally beneficial?
The riots at U.C. Berkeley on February 1st, 2017 in protest to controversial speaker Milo Yiannopoulos.Do restrictions to free and open discussion for the sake of perceived public good actually undermine mankind's overall ability to gain knowledge?
A young girl in the second grade was expelled from her Catholic elementary school because the school became aware of her immune deficiency disease and perceived it to be AIDS.When should the natural sciences and empirical proof definitively dismiss religious knowledge beliefs?
Keystone Pipeline protest by Native AmericansTo what extent do global economic policies and procedures trump indigenous traditional values?
Joshua Bell, who is a famous professional violinist. Performs as homeless in subwayTo what extent should the reputation or status of an artist influence an individual's or society's appreciation of their artistic content?
Logic used "Fine for Now" by Grizzly Bear (2009) and "I Am the Greatest" by Cassius Clay (1963) in his song I am the Greatest.To what extent should previous knowledge be utilized and incorperated into the formation and discovery of future knowledge?
A 24 year old Japanese woman named Matsuri Takahashi committed suicide due to stress from overwork. This kind of situation has been branded as "Karoshi", a word that is specific to Japan.Does assigning a name to a phenomenon change the value of a situation?
My RLS is the tradition in Chinese cultures for shark fin soup to be served at weddings.By what standards can an outdated cultural belief be considered worth maintaining despite ethical concerns?
Dana Gioia was one of the founders of Operation Homecoming, a program for veterans and soldiers to learn how to express and release their traumas or PTSD through art.Should communities operationalize a process to pursue redemption of trauma through art?
new language called Koro that was discovered by a linguist team. However the team that discovered it also found out it was in danger of extinction because only about 800 people speak it.How influential is language in the continuation and/or preservation of culture?
The city of Cambridge, MA put a ban on retail establishments using plastic bags. Customers must bring a reusable bag when shopping or they will get charged 10 centsTo what extent should regulations be used to force a change in human behavior and how effective historically have such efforts been?
In 2013, a mathematician named Scott Rickard set out to create a piece of music that could be considered, on an objective level, to be the ugliest piece of music ever composed.Is it appropriate to superimpose objective measurements of knowledge that is subjective in nature?
Pepe the frog (internet meme) labelled as hate speechTo what extent can culture be controlled in a free society?
TOK Oral FYIs: http://schstok.weebly.com/tok-oral-info.html
https://ibpublishing.ibo.org/server2/rest/app/tsm.xql?doc=d_0_tokxx_tsm_1305_1_e&part=4&chapter=4
We only need your help in better suggesting things to go into the RLS box.
For Day 3:
Today is a relatively simple day. Below is a series of emails we’ve received in the last year or so from a TOK helper site that are actually relatively good at showing how contemporary events (aka news articles) actually have a range of TOK issues in them. Each monthly email has a set of about 8 articles/links that they have identified the AOKs/WOKs intersecting in the article’s RLS. They also for many distinguish between a first order KQ (that still has a foot in the real world (for example: Was Castro a good leader of Cuba?)) and then a second order KQ that is truly desired to be explored for the TOK Oral task: (for example: How is our view of the past shaped by our cultural or historical/time perspective?)
YOUR GENERAL TASK with class of 2018 through Thanksgiving is to tweet to @SCHSTOK or email me or simply bring up in your class a range of contemporary examples/articles from your subject area and try to guide students to see the TOK KQs that emerge from these RLSs.
If you want a specific task for today it could be to look through TOK articles linked on Twitter at https://twitter.com/SCHSTOK and email me the link and your attempts at writing KQs that emerge from that article/RLS.
explore April's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resources educate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the April edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter
We're very happy to announce that we have just passed 10,000 likes on our Facebook page. This page has grown organically since we first set it up in 2009, and is a great place to begin if you are looking for real life situations to help understand and illustrate TOK concepts.
You can see the way we are developing our new 'Big Question' approach to TOK by checking out the sample lessons on this page. In August, we will be releasing a huge new resource for TOK which delivers the course around this approach, and brings together all the different strands of our resources.
We will also be updating our critical thinking section of the site over the next few days, adding a few links to articles, and a lesson plan for a class of pre-IB Diploma thinkers. You can see this for yourself here.
To access the sample Google Slides presentation of this month's newsletter, click the image below. The presentation can be copied to your own Google Drive, and adapted for use in lessons. Note that a full presentation (ie slides for all 15 of the main RLSs) is provided with the premium TOK newsletter subscription
RLSs & KQs
As always, we feature the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. To receive all the RLSs like this (plus 7 extra ones, and 5 further 'quick' RLSs), upgrade your subscription by clicking on the button below.
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1. Historians and gamers
AoKs/WoKs: History, imagination, the arts
Big Question: Representing reality
First order KQs: How accurate will ‘Call of Duty: World War II’ be?
Second order KQs: Does a 'dialogue between academic history and video games' help us to engage with the past? What role does imagination play in helping us gain knowledge about the past?
Description: “Historians interested in seeing where a huge portion of society is engaging with themes, ideas and material from the past should – and often do – look to games. How history is represented in these titles, how the player interacts with the world and why historical settings are utilised in such a way are all big topics worthy of academic attention.”
Discussion points and exploration: As games such as Call of Duty get more sophisticated, their recreations of the past become ever more extensive and complete. Combine this with the fact that they are played by many people around the world, and you have a very powerful source of knowledge about history. But how useful is this knowledge? Can it provide us with an insight that more traditional sources can’t provide us with? And how important is it for historians to be aware that this informs the way many people interact with the past?
Source: The Guardian
2. Milk substitutes
AoKs/WoKs: Language
KQs: Does the connotation or the denotation of a word convey its meaning?
Description: “There is no such thing as soy milk. The same goes for almond, coconut, hemp, rice, cashew, hazelnut, and oat. Milk comes from mammals and there are no lactating almonds. While plant-based beverages have sought to broaden milk's definition since the Chinese company Vitasoy entered the US market in 1979, the Food and Drug Administration still has a very specific, cow-centric, definition.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: Big Think
3. Revolutionary misconception
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences
KQs: How many paradigms are based on fundamental misconceptions?
Description: “A study of people born with one hand suggests neuroscientists may have fundamentally misunderstood the way the brain is organised, a scientist has claimed. Dr Tamar Makin, of University College London, said the new theory – if proved correct – would have “massive implications”, adding it was “mind-blowing” to think that scientists could have been mistaken for so long.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: The Independent
4. Intuitive reason
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, intuition
KQs: Is reason a type of intuition?
Description: “We suggest that reason is very much like any other cognitive mechanism—it is itself a form of intuition. Like other intuitions, it is a specialised mechanism. The specificity of reason is to bear... on reasons. Reason delivers intuitions about relationships between reasons and conclusions: some reasons are intuitively better than others. When you want to convince someone, you use reason to construct arguments. When someone wants to convince you of something, you use reason to evaluate their arguments.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: New Humanist
5. Tuning out truth
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, reason, intuition
KQs: To what extent are we persuaded by facts?
Description: “...facts alone are feeble things. Given more information, most people don’t change their minds, even when the new data seems to support the opposite argument. They convince themselves that the information is misleading (“alternative”) or simply wrong (“fake”). They tune out stuff that’s uncomfortable to hear and tune in to cable news programs like reliably tell them that their intuition about the world is even more right than they knew.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: The Atlantic
6. Multiculturalism vs colonialism
AoKs/WoKs: History, human sciences, language
KQs: How do politicians use the past to consolidate power in the present?
Description: “Will the xenophobic populism that brought Brexit to the U.K. and Donald Trump to the White House claim the Elysée Palace, too? Le Pen’s expected advance has been one of the few constants in a campaign marked by surprising, dispiriting twists. To a historian of French colonialism like me, one of the most revealing is the renewed debate over the memory and teaching of the colonial past. The candidates’ positions on this issue can be seen as a revealing barometer of French attitudes toward immigration, race and multiculturalism today.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: The Conversation
7. Personality types
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
KQs: Can personality types be categorized?
Description: “At the topmost level, there are two types of people in the world: Those who think personality types can be categorized and those who can't. Among those in the first group are psychologists who began developing a system for classifying personality traits based on an analysis of language way back in the1880s.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: Big Think
8. Cultural norms
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, emotion
KQs: Can conclusions be drawn about an entire nation’s personality type?
Description: “Whether it’s the caricature of the introverted English, the brash Americans or the industrious Japanese, national stereotypes are easy to come by. But do countries really have their own distinct personalities? When psychologists have given the same personality test to hundreds or thousands of people from different nations, they have indeed found that the average scores tend to come out differently across cultures. In other words, the average personality in one country often really is different from the average personality in another.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: BBC
What extra KQs and RLSs did we explore in the premium newsletter this month?
In depth RLSs -
Quick RLSs:
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The TOK newsletter presentation
Follow the image below to take you to our sample Google Slides Presentation for this month's newsletter. The premium newsletter features all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To download the presentation, select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The TOK Sessions Pack
Our TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Historical Investigation Pack
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is also ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Purchase the HIP
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explore March's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the March edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter
We are continuing to link the stories in the newsletter to the 8 Big Questions, our shortly-to-be released new approach to delivering the TOK course.
You can download some sample TOK lessons based on this approach on this page; we'll be providing updates on the progress of this revolutionary new resource over the next few months. If you update to the premium newsletter, you'll also have access to the Big Questions themselves on the TOK newsletter archive page; use the button below to do this.
Finally, we’d like to remind you that the latest version of the TOK Presentation Guide is now available for download. This is an updated version of the original guide, with brand new final chapter featuring the 7-step summary, and exemplar presentation. Follow this link for more details.
To access the Google Slides sample presentation of this month's newsletter, click the image below. The premium newsletter comes with a full presentation, with each RLS covered in this way.
As always, we feature the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. To receive all the RLSs like this (plus 7 extra ones, and 5 further 'quick' RLSs), upgrade your subscription by clicking on the button below.
Upgrade to the premium subscription
RLSs & KQs
1. Himba perception
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception, indigenous knowledge systems, human sciences
Big Question: Perspectives
First order KQs: How does Himba culture differ from Western culture?
Second order KQs: Does culture shape how our senses acquire knowledge? Are the limits of sense perception determined by nature or nurture?
Description: “The Himba people of Namibia can see fine details and ignore distraction much better than most other human beings – a finding that may reflect the many ways that modern life is changing our minds and abilities.”
Discussion points and exploration: This real life situation illustrates very nicely the difference between different cultures (industrialised, large-scale societies, and indigenous societies) when it comes to the limits of sense perception. Is the article right in suggesting that the differences may be due to lifestyles, and our dependency on technology to provide us with an accurate picture of the world? Or is the evidence still insufficient to say that?
Source: BBC
2. True lies
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, faith, emotion
KQs: What determines whether facts are believable?
Description: “I remember looking at her and thinking, ‘She’s totally lying.’ At the same time, I remember something in my mind saying, ‘And that doesn’t matter.’” For Daniel Shaw, believing the words of the guru he had spent years devoted to wasn’t blind faith exactly. It was something he chose. “I remember actually consciously making that choice.” There are facts, and there are beliefs, and there are things you want so badly to believe that they become as facts to you.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Atlantic
3. Living language
AoKs/WoKs: Language
KQs: In what way is language like a ‘child’?
Description: “Kory Stamper defines words for a living. In her new book, Word by Word, she documents the life of a lexicographer, from maintaining focus in the office to tackling the near-impossible task of defining English. As she explains in the above video, language is always changing.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: Vox
4. Cultural feelings
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion
KQs: How can we know whether our emotions a product of our culture?
Description: “When scientists set aside the classical view and just look at the data, a radically different explanation for emotion comes to light. We find that emotions are not universal but vary from culture to culture. They are not triggered; you create them.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
5. Rejecting GM food
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences
KQs: Should scientific policy be decided democratically?
Description: ‘A majority of EU countries voted on Monday against allowing two new genetically modified crops to be grown in Europe, batting the contentious decision on cultivation of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO) in Europe back to the EU executive… However, the votes against were not decisive in blocking their introduction because the opposition did not represent a "qualified majority" - also including countries that make up at least 65 percent of the EU population.’
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: DW
6. Quantifying the unquantifiable
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, human sciences
KQs: Is happiness objectively quantifiable?
Description: “Norway is the happiest place on Earth, according to a United Nations agency report - toppling neighbour Denmark from the number one position. The World Happiness Report measures "subjective well-being" - how happy the people are, and why. Denmark, Iceland, Switzerland and and Finland round out the top five, while the Central African Republic came last.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: BBC
7. Mapping language
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: What does a map of Europe look like, based on linguistics?
Description: “This linguistic map paints an alternative map of Europe, displaying the language families that populate the continent, and the lexical distance between the languages. The closer that distance, the more words they have in common. The further the distance, the harder the mutual comprehension.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: Big Think
8. Indigenous cures
AoKs/WoKs: Indigenous knowledge systems, reason, human sciences
KQs: How do Indigenous approaches to health differ from Western ones?
Description: “I am not what might be called a credulous person. But I would agree that the world is not as solid as we like to believe – complicated, multi-layered and mostly beyond my comprehension”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian (See also this more general article on Ayahuasca)
What extra KQs and RLSs did we explore in the premium newsletter this month?
In depth RLSs -
Quick RLSs:
To upgrade your subscription, click on the button below.
Upgrade to the premium subscription
The TOK newsletter presentation
Follow the image below to take you to our sample Google Slides Presentation for February's newsletter. The premium newsletter features all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To download the sample presentation, select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder, and then make any changes to suit whatever you are currently covering in TOK.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Historical Investigation Pack
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is also ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Purchase the HIP
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
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explore February's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the February edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free TOK newsletter
We have made one significant change to the premium newsletter this month, which we are very excited about: linking each RLS to one of our new ‘8 Big Questions’. This is a unique approach to TOK, that bases the delivery of the course on questions, rather than the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing. Amongst many other benefits, it allows the course to be driven more naturally by RLSs, gives a more complete and interlinked coverage of the nature of knowledge, and prepares students much more effectively for the essay and presentation.
We’ll be creating an array of resources to support this new approach during the coming months. You can see the first of these Big Questions indicated on the first RLS; by upgrading to the premium newsletter, you'll have access to all of them, with explanations of what each one comprises.
Earlier this month, we were honoured to be asked to provide a short video for the opening of the fantastic United World College TOK Conference, at Maastricht. This is organised purely by students, and has become arguably the foremost event of its kind in the world. You can view the video here.
Finally, we’d like to remind you that the latest version of the TOK Presentation Guide is now available for download. This is an updated version of the original guide, with brand new final chapter featuring the 7-step summary, and exemplar presentation. Follow this link for more details.
To access the Google Slides sample presentation of this month's newsletter, click the image below. The premium newsletter comes with a full presentation, with each RLS covered in this way.
As always, we feature the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. To receive all the RLSs like this (plus 7 extra ones, and 5 further 'quick' RLSs), upgrade your subscription by clicking on the button below.
Upgrade your subscription
News stories & knowledge questions
1. The language of morality
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, language
First order KQs: What are Nigel Farage’s moral principles?
Second order KQs: To what extent does our moral comfort zone exist within the language we speak? What is the relationship between language and ethics?
Description: “Mr Farage addressed an enthusiastic audience at the annualConservative Political Action Conference, as right-wing Americans fully embraced the nationalism that characterises Trumpism and Brexit. "Our real friends in the world speak English, have common law, and stand by us in times of crisis," Mr Farage told the room of Trump supporters.”
Discussion points and exploration: This story illustrates the strong link that exists between language and identity, and the extent to which that identity then forms the basis of our moral outlook, and how we gather ethical knowledge. For many, the language we speak is synonymous with who we are, and who we identify with. But what are the implications of this in a globalised world? Should we seek to expand our circle of empathy beyond those with whom we can comfortably communicate? Or is Farage right - our friends are the ones who share our linguistic sensibilities?
Big Question: 3 - Connections
Source: The Independent
2. Virtual history
AoKs/WoKs: History
KQs: Can virtual reality improve our understanding of history?
Description: “VR makes us complicit in the unfolding of the story and by doing so it makes the past appear as present time - a sequence of events that is constantly unfolding around us. Quite the opposite of thinking about History as something that is static and buried in the past.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: BBC
3. Revolutionary art
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, ethics
KQs: Does purpose undermine art?
Description: “We will never stop looking at the art of the Russian avant garde, nor should we. Yet we need to place it in its true context. It is a lazy, immoral lie to keep pretending there was anything glorious about the brutal experiment Lenin imposed on Russia – or anything innocent about its all-too-brilliant propaganda art. Perhaps the Royal Academy is about to open that very show, but its shallow title seems all too happy to cash in on revolutionary chic. No doubt the Morning Star’s art critic will be there in a flash. Me, I will be remembering the kulaks.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
4. Scientific fame
AoKs/WoKs: The natural sciences
KQs: What determines scientific fame?
Description: “Throughout his life, Humboldt sought out the world’s interconnections. Today knowledge can seem hopelessly fragmented. The sciences and humanities speak different languages, the scientific disciplines frequently seem incommensurable and the university itself often feels more like a multiversity. Against this backdrop, Humboldt represents the aspiration for encompassing order; if only we look deeply enough, we can locate an intricate underlying harmony.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Conversation
5. Distance psychology
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
KQs: To what extent is science based on speculation?
Description: “The American Psychiatric Association has a longstanding taboo on evaluating public figures from afar. It’s called the Goldwater Rule, named after an infamous magazine article in which politician Barry Goldwater’s psychological stability was assessed by thousands of psychiatrists. The rule forbids psychiatrists, who are medical doctors, from making judgments about a public figure’s mental health without personally evaluating them. But the temptation to break it is always strong in presidential election years.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: Vox
6. Articulating faith
AoKs/WoKs: Faith, religious knowledge systems, language
KQs: What is the relationship between faith and religious knowledge systems?
Description: “As a writer and scholar of religions, I [Reza Aslan] am often asked how, knowing all that I know about the religions of the world, I can still call myself a believer, let alone a Muslim. It's a reasonable question. Considering the role that religion so often plays in fueling conflicts abroad and inspiring bigotry at home, it is not always so easy to defend the value of religion in society. And, in a world in which reason and religion seem to be moving further apart, it is certainly understandable why so many people view religious faith as the hallmark of an irrational mind.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: CNN
7. Formal expression
AoKs/WoKs: Language
KQs: Why does language use change over time?
Description: “When it comes to texting, the period, full stop, point – whatever you call it – has been getting a lot of attention. People have begun noticing slight changes to the way our smallest punctuation mark is deployed, from declarations that it’s going out of style to claims that it’s becoming angry. What they’re actually noticing is written language becoming more flexible, with texting possessing its own set of stylistic norms (sometimes informally called “textspeak” or “textese”).”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Conversation
8. Rosling's numbers
AoKs/WoKs: Mathematics, human sciences
KQs: What potential does statistics have to provide us with knowledge about the world?
Description: “Rosling was also one of the founders of Gapminder, an incredible “fact-tank” — as opposed to “think tank” — whose mission is supplanting the wealth of disinformation floating around out there with actual, data-backed facts. It’s eye-opening and a ton of fun if you like knowing things. Much like Rosling himself.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: Big Think
What extra KQs and RLSs did we explore in the premium newsletter this month?
KQs that we consider in depth this month:
And our five ‘quick’ KQs:
Upgrade your subscription
The TOK newsletter presentation
Follow the image below to take you to our sample Google Slides Presentation for February's newsletter. The premium newsletter features all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To download the sample presentation, select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder, and then make any changes to suit whatever you are currently covering in TOK.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Historical Investigation Pack
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is also ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Purchase the HIP
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2017 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
theoryofknowledge.net
12 Magrath Avenue
Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
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explore January's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the January edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free TOK newsletter
Our real life situations come from several different sources, and cover many of the different AoKs and WoKs. This month the stories have a particular emphasis on how we use language, and the way this affects the knowledge it imparts.
We’d also like to remind you that the latest version of the TOK Presentation Guide is now available for download. This is an updated version of the original guide, with brand new final chapter featuring the 7-step summary, and exemplar presentation. Follow this link for more details.
Click on the image below to take you to the sample Google Slides presentation for this month's newsletter. This can be copied to your own Google Drive, and you can then adapt for use in lessons. Note that the premium version of the newsletter presents all 15 of its RLSs in this way.
News stories & knowledge questions
1. Untranslatable emotions
AoKs/WoKs: Language, emotion
First order KQs: What makes a word or term difficult to translate?
Second order KQs: Can we increase the range of our emotional experiences by increasing our vocabularies?
Description: “[Tim] Lomas’s Positive Lexicography Project aims to capture the many flavours of good feelings (some of which are distinctly bittersweet) found across the world, in the hope that we might start to incorporate them all into our daily lives. We have already borrowed many emotion words from other languages, after all – think “frisson”, from French, or “schadenfreude”, from German – but there are many more that have not yet wormed their way into our vocabulary. Lomas has found hundreds of these "untranslatable" experiences so far – and he’s only just begun.
Discussion points and exploration: This provides us with a lovely store of words that take us beyond the schadenfreude and saudade examples, and allow us to really explore our emotional range, and how that depends (or not) on the vocabulary available to us. Do we need to have a word for something to be able to emotionally experience it?
Source: BBC
2. Newspeak
AoKs/WoKs: Language, the arts
KQs: What is the relationship between truth and language?
Description: “The post-truth era certainly shares aspects of the dystopian world of Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. Michael Gove’s infamous comment that Britain has had enough of experts is just one step away from 2+2 = 5. In the interrogation scene in 1984 this is the most appalling moment: before now we read it as a ludicrous indictment of the rejection of reality (surely, we conclude, the party itself must know that 2+2 = 4; science, machines all depend on it). In Nineteen Eighty-Four, the elite, personified by O’Brien, foster and control this willingness to believe one thing one day, and one thing another."
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: Guardian
3. Hero revision
AoKs/WoKs: History, ethics
Qs: Why do our views about heroes change over time?
Description: “Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated on this day 69 years ago but his ideas of Hindu-Muslim unity still haunt India's Hindu hardliners, writes BBC Hindi's Rajesh Joshi. The discomfort of the Hindu hardline right with Mahatma Gandhi became apparent once again when a senior leader of the governing Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) recently described Prime Minister Narendra Modi as a "bigger brand name" than the iconic leader of India's freedom struggle.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: BBC
4. Scientific communication
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, language
KQs: Is it possible to find a balance between clarity and over-simplification when it comes to communicating scientific knowledge?
Description: “Scientists and the media need to communicate more science and communicate it better. Good communication ensures that scientific progress benefits society, bolsters democracy, weakens the potency of fake news andmisinformation and fulfills researchers’ responsibility to engage with the public. Such beliefs have motivated training programs, workshops and a research agendafrom the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine on learning more about science communication. A resounding question remains for science communicators: What can we do better?”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: The Conversation
5. Alternative facts
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: Do euphemisms always impede our understanding of the world?
Description: “President Trump's special adviser Kellyanne Conway proposed something new on Sunday: "alternative facts." The strange phrase entered the lexicon when Conway told NBC's Chuck Todd that the numerous misstatements in press secretary Sean Spicer's angry statement to reporters Saturday were actually "alternative facts." The phrase called into the question Conway's understanding of the word "facts" and caused widespread mockery on Sunday.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: CNN
6. Value of movies
AoKs/WoKs: The arts
KQs: Do fictional representations of the world help us to understand it?
Description: “Movies matter more now than ever… it’s the way we look at ourselves and learn and communicate.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: Hollywood Reporter
7. Ownership of art
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, human sciences
KQs: Who ‘owns’ art?
Description: “It could become one of the most important legal battles in music - Sir Paul McCartney is suing Sony over control of The Beatles' back catalogue. The star has gone to a US court, seeking to regain the publishing rights to 267 of the band's classic songs. He's been trying to get them back since the 1980s, when Michael Jackson famously out-bid him for the rights. Jackson's debt-ridden estatesold the songs to Sony last year, along with others including New York, New York.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: BBC
8. Non-objective journalism
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
KQs: What are the implications on our understanding of the world of the rise of non-objective journalism?
Description: “As a political scientist focused on game theory, I approach the media from the perspective of strategic choice. Media outlets make decisions about how to position themselves within a market and how to signal to news consumers what kinds outlets they are in ideological terms. But they also interact strategically with politicians, who use journalists’ ideological leanings and accusations of leanings to undermine the credibility of even the most valid criticisms.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: The Conversation
The new TOK newsletter presentation
Follow the image below to take you to a sample of our Google Slides Presentation for January's newsletter. The premium newsletter includes all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter presented in this way, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To download the presentation, select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder, and then make any changes to suit whatever you are currently covering in TOK.
We hope you and your students enjoy this new addition to the TOK newsletter!
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
7 more big real life situations, prompting us to ask -
And 5 'quick' RLSs, leading us to -
To receive all this, as well as access to an archive of premium newsletters reaching back to November 2014, click on the button below.
Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Historical Investigation Pack
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is also ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Purchase the HIP
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2017 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
theoryofknowledge.net
12 Magrath Avenue
Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
Add us to your address book
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explore December's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the December edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletterWe hope you had a good Christmas, and have started the new year positively.
Our latest version of the TOK Presentation Guide is now available for download. This is an updated version of the original guide, with brand new final chapter featuring a model presentation on PowerPoint/Google Slides, plus a step-by-step summary of how to create a TOK presentation (This final chapter can be purchased separately). Follow this link for more details.
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is also ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Download a free sample of the HIP
Click on the image below to take you to the Google Slides version of this month's first RLS. If you upgrade to the premium newsletter, you will receive all 15 of the main RLSs presented in this way.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we present the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. If you would like to receive all the RLSs in this format, plus 7 additional 'big' RLSs and 5 'quick' RLSs, as well as the Google Slides presentation for the newsletter, upgrade to the premium newsletter by hitting the button below.
Upgrade to the premium TOK newsletter
1. Critical cartography
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception, human sciences
First order KQs: How are world maps created?
Second order KQs: Are our visualisations of the world valid? How can self-aggrandisement shape the way information about the world is presented?
Description: “My struggle to make a flat map out of the plastic globe is indicative of a challenge mapmakers have faced for centuries: It is mathematically impossibleto translate the surface of a sphere onto a plane without some form of distortion. To solve this problem, mathematicians and cartographers have developed a huge library of representations of the globe, each distorting a certain attribute and preserving others. For instance, the Mercator projection preserves the shape of countries while distorting the size, especially near the north and south pole.”
Discussion points and exploration: This is a lovely video about the difficulties of creating an accurate 2D representation of the world, and the compromises that are made in order to do so. Why has the Mercator projection ended up as the ubiquitous version of the world map, particularly given its problems? What are the implications of this in terms of how we visualise the world?
Source: Vox
2. Fashionable insult
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: Do our insults define or reflect society?
Description: “The term has undergone a curious journey to become the most combustible insult of 2016. It emerged a few years ago on American campuses asa means of criticising the hypersensitivity of a younger generation, where it was tangled up in the debate over safe spaces and no platforming. A much-memed line from Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club expresses a very early version of the sentiment in 1996: “You are not special. You are not a beautiful and unique snowflake. You are the same organic and decaying matter as everyone else.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Guardian
3. Biased mathematics
AoKs/WoKs: Mathematics
First order KQs: Why has the role of algorithms in increased in importance?
Second order KQs: Are algorithms biased?
Description: “Life-threatening or not, the algorithms, artificial intelligence and machine learning operating away from public view (Forrester predicts AI investment will grow 300 per cent in 2017) are increasingly being questioned. Technologists, politicians and academics have all called for greater transparency around the systems used by dominant tech firms.”
Discussion points and exploration: Algorithms are playing an increasing role in our lives, and the way in which we are controlled, and we have considered the implications of this in terms of various areas of knowledge, such as ethics and human sciences. But this article is interesting for the way in which it questions the objectivity of algorithms, reminding us that although mathematics itself cannot be biased, those who do the programming can - so does this mean algorithms should never be trusted to make our decisions for us?
Source: Wired
4. Hypothetically relevant
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics
KQs: Is the runaway trolley dilemma more relevant than ever?
Description: “The trolley problem highlights a fundamental tension between two schools of moral thought. The utilitarian perspective dictates that most appropriate action is the one that achieves the greatest good for the greatest number. Meanwhile, the deontological perspective asserts that certain actions – like killing an innocent person – are just wrong, even if they have good consequences. In both versions of the trolley problem above, utilitarians say you should sacrifice one to save five, while deontologists say you should not.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Guardian
5. Indigenous voice
AoKs/WoKs: Indigenous knowledge questions, language
KQs: Should knowledge be protected? How has our attitude to indigenous knowledge and culture changed over time?
Description: “For the first time in Peru’s history, a national news broadcast has been aired entirely in Quechua, the indigenous language of the Inca empire, which is still spoken by some 4 million Peruvians. Called Ñuqanchik – which means ‘all of us’ in Quechua – the daily news programme that launched this week targets speakers of the language that some historians trace back to Peru’s earliest civilizations 5,000 years ago.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Guardian
6. Better than ever?
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, mathematics, history, reason, intuition
KQs: What constitutes definitive evidence in the human sciences and history?
Description: “A recent survey asked, “All things considered, do you think the world is getting better or worse, or neither getting better nor worse?” In Sweden, 10 percent thought things are getting better, in the US the figure was only 6 percent, and in Germany only 4 percent. Very few people think the world is getting better.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Vox
7. Morality and the law
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, human sciences
KQs: How closely aligned are morality and the law?
Description: “A French woman in her sixties who murdered her husband in 2012 has been released after a second intervention by President Francois Hollande…. Campaigners were overjoyed by the news. But Virginie Duval, the head of the French union of magistrates, complained that the president had acted "to please public opinion", pointing out that the judiciary had followed the law when it rejected Ms Sauvage's appeals.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: BBC
8. Gut feeling
AoKs/WoKs: Intuition, reason
KQs: Is intuition alone sufficient for making a valid ethical decision?
Description: “Helping someone in desperate need is an ethical choice, yet it is a choice we would all make without hesitating, i.e. thinking a single thought. The reason, according to Harvard Law Professor Glenn Cohen, is that ethical choices start in the gut. Our intuition, programmed my millions of years of evolution, instructs us what to do without needing rational deliberation.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Big Think
The new TOK newsletter presentation
Follow the image below to take you to a sample of our Google Slides Presentation for December's newsletter. The premium newsletter includes all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter presented in this way, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To download the presentation, select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder, and then make any changes to suit whatever you are currently covering in TOK.
We hope you and your students enjoy this new addition to the TOK newsletter!
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2017 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
theoryofknowledge.net
12 Magrath Avenue
Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
Add us to your address book
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November's events and issues
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the November edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter
Our latest version of the TOK Presentation Guide will be released next week. This is an updated version of the original guide, with the biggest change being a Google Slides (or PowerPoint) 'model' presentation, with a step-by-step overview of how to create a similar presentation using your own RLS and KQ. The guide will be released on 15th December, and can be ordered here. Note that you can order the model presentation separately from the rest of the guide.
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is now ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Download a free sample of the HIP
The Premium Newsletter now comes with a Google Slides presentation. You can see how this works for the first of our RLSs by clicking on the image below. This can be copied to your own Google Drive, and you can then adapt for use in lessons.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we present the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. If you would like to receive all the RLSs in this format, plus 7 additional 'big' RLSs and 5 'quick' RLSs, as well as the Google Slides presentation for the newsletter, upgrade to the premium newsletter by hitting the button below.
Upgrade to the premium newsletter
1. Death of Fidel
AoKs/WoKs: History
First order KQs: Was Castro a good leader of Cuba?
Second order KQs: How is our view of the past shaped by our perspective?
Description: "The Cuban people are feeling sad because of the loss of our commander in chief Fidel Castro Ruz, and we wish him, wherever he is, that he is blessed, and us Cubans love him," a young Cuban woman told CNN… [on the other hand…] Revelers spilled into the streets of Miami. They popped champagne, clanged pots, cheered and waved the Cuban flag in jubilation. They stood outside the popular Versailles restaurant in Little Havana with signs reading, "Satan, Fidel is now yours."
Discussion points and exploration: One of the biggest questions in TOK is why history is constantly subject to reinterpretation. Perspective - determined by social, economic, ethnic, or gender - is a key part of the answer to this. There are few leaders as divisive as Castro, who was a hero to some, and a villain to others. Can we reach an objective decision about his achievements and legacy? Or is it impossible to escape our personal and shared paradigms?
Source: CNN
2. Perils of prediction
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, mathematics
KQs: Can human behaviour be understood via generalisations?
Description: “Polls have missed recent elections in the U.S. and abroad by margins at least as big. Every poll, and every prediction based on it, is probabilistic in nature: There’s always a chance the leader loses. And Clinton probably didn’t even lose the national popular vote; she just didn’t win it by as much as polls suggested. But Tuesday’s miss was an important one because Clinton appeared to lead by a margin small enough that it might just have been polling error. That turned out to be mostly true — true enough for her to lose in the Electoral College, and for Democrats to fall far short of taking control of the Senate.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Vox & FiveThirtyEight
3. Erasing identity
AoKs/WoKs: IKS, ethics
KQs: Why do governments fear different knowledge systems to their own cultures?
Description: “For nearly a century, the Canadian government took indigenous Canadians from their families and placed them in church-run boarding schools, forcibly assimilating them to Western culture. Children as young as 2 or 3 years old were taken from their homes, their language extinguished, their culture destroyed.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
4. Personal history
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, history
KQs: Can we understand big events via the experiences of one person?
Description: “The National Geographic cover photo of Gula was taken by Steve McCurry in 1984 in a refugee camp in Pakistan. It became one of the defining images of a conflict between mujahideen insurgents and Soviet occupying forces...Gula is just one of many Afghans to be caught up in the ongoing effort to persuade refugees to go home. Nadra says it has detected 60,675 cards that were fraudulently obtained by foreign nationals.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Guardian
5. Ghostly science
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, sense perception
KQs: Can we trust our senses?
Description: “...the frontoparietal cortex is the same brain region that lets us sense our own bodies, and be aware of our own kinesthetic motions. If it can be duped, how do we know that it’s always reliable? How sure are you that your hand is holding a mobile phone, that your thumb is scrolling on the screen, and that you’re tucking it away in your pocket? It feels real, your frontoparietal cortex tells you that’s very real, but this experiment suggests it could very well be an illusion. How confident are you that your sense of your own body is real? It’s something we haven’t got to the bottom of yet.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Big Think
6. Invention of progress
AoKs/WoKs: History, human sciences
KQs: Which central assumptions form the basis of how we understand history?
Description: “Such a belief may seem self-evident today, but most people in the more-remote past believed that history moved in some kind of cycle or followed a path that was determined by higher powers. The idea that humans should and could work consciously to make the world a better place for themselves and for generations to come is by and large one that emerged in the two centuries between Christopher Columbus and Isaac Newton. Of course, just believing that progress could be brought about is not enough—one must bring it about. The modern world began when people resolved to do so.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
7. Facebook News
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, technology
KQs: How should the news be reported to ensure accuracy?
Description: “... it has 1.6 billion users and is becoming an ever more important place for them to share news. More than 40% of the population of the United States say they get news on Facebook - and for many it is where they go to share and comment on stories. Stories like this - "Pope Francis Shocks World, Endorses Donald Trump for President", "Barack Obama Admits He Was Born in Kenya", or "Trump said in 1998 'If I were to run, I'd run as a Republican. They're the dumbest group of voters in the country'." What all of those stories had in common was that they were completely made up. That did not stop them being shared by millions of Facebook users.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: BBC
8. Faith, evidence, and repetition
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, reason
KQs: What is truth based on?
Description: “Neil DeGrasse Tyson, 58, is an American astrophysicist who is the director the of Hayden Planetarium in New York. A committed science communicator, he frequently appears on US television shows and has published 13 books, the latest of which is called Welcome to the Universe.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Guardian
Also included in November's premium newsletter...
7 more big real life situations, prompting us to ask -
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theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
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The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
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October's big real life situations?
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the October edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter
The new Essay Guide for May 2017 is now available for download. This now comes as a pack, and includes two presentations designed to introduce the essay writing task, and tools to enable students to unpack the PTs on their own, and target the specific assessment tasks. For more information, and to purchase, followthis link.
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects is also proving very successful - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP). Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Download a free sample of the HIP
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we present the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. If you would like to receive all the RLSs in this format, plus 7 additional 'big' RLSs and 5 'quick' RLSs, as well as the Google Slides presentation for the newsletter, upgrade to the premium newsletter by hitting the button below.
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1. Dangerous history
AoKs/WoKs: History, human sciences
First order KQs: What role do governments play in deciding what history should be learned?
Second order KQs: In what way can an approach to history be ‘dangerous’? What should the purpose of history be? What can we tell about a culture from the way in which it produces historical knowledge? Who should decide what history we learn?
Description: “Neil MacGregor, the former director of the British Museum, has bemoaned Britain’s narrow view of its own history, calling it “dangerous and regrettable” for focusing almost exclusively on the “sunny side”. Speaking before the Berlin opening of his highly popular exhibition Germany – Memories of a Nation, MacGregor expressed his admiration for Germany’s rigorous appraisal of its history which he said could not be more different to that of Britain.”
Discussion points and exploration: We’ve thought about the purpose of history, and who is in charge of it before, but this is a very clear article that explains how and why using it to celebrate achievements, rather than acknowledge mistakes and moral bungling can provide us with a very misleading picture of our own identities and culture. Look also at the use of the term Mahnmale - why does this word, and what it represents, not exist in the English language? You can read more on these two conflicting approaches to the past, and how MacGregor believes knowledge about the past should be presented, in this article.
Source: Guardian
2. Strange memories
AoKs/WoKs: Memory, human sciences
KQs: Do memories require photographs to keep them alive?
Description: “as among all snapshots, there is a broader connection too. Walker describes it as a shared relationship to time. “Every person in a photo is older than when that photo was taken,” she elaborated. “I look at a photo and I know someone is probably dead and that one day I'll be dead too. There must be some secret of time held in these images. I can’t help thinking that if I just study them hard enough, I'll finally be able to understand it.”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: The Atlantic
3. Privilege strutting
AoKs/WoKs: Language, ethics
KQs: Does our word choice indicate our ethical perspective?
Description: “Bollywood actress Priyanka Chopra has apologised after being criticised for modelling an "insensitive" top on a Conde Nast Traveller magazine cover. The top has the words "migrant", "refugee" and "outsider" crossed out while the word "traveller" stands out. Both the actress and Conde Nast were criticised over the "privileged" message, with many pointing out that being a refugee was "not a choice". Conde Nast told the BBC their intention was to highlight labelling of people.”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: BBC
4. Three parent family
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, natural sciences
KQs: How are our ethical views shaped by our perspectives?
Description: “The headlines earlier this week that a baby had been born using DNA from three people got the world very excited… While the little boy isn't the first baby to be created by combining DNA from three people, the method used is a new and significant one that experts say could help families with rare genetic conditions to conceive healthy babies… But it's not such an easy solution. While specialists are calling it breakthrough technology, critics of assisted reproductive technology (ART) warn doctors about playing God.”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: BBC
5. Allure of swearing
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences, ethics
KQs: What makes a swear word offensive?
Description: “Whether you use “bad” language or not, it’s clear that this is a family of words with unique power. It’s not completely clear why. We’re not talking about slurs, foul language intended to denigrate someone or a group of people. We know where that power comes from — hate — and why it’s potent: It hurts people.”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: Big Think
6. Nostalgia as a way of knowing
AoKs/WoKs: History, human sciences, emotion
KQs: To what extent is our view of the past shaped by nostalgia?
Description: “Reactionaries, I argue, are nostalgic. They're thinking about a past that's been lost, and that past is always there. You may lose hope in a particular picture of the future, but you have a picture of the past that's untouchable, which is why I say... "Hopes can be extinguished but nostalgia is irrefutable."
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: Vox
7. Self portrait
AoKs/WoKs: The arts
KQs: To what extent can a person’s ‘essence’ be captured in a portrait?
Description: “Even when Picasso moved decisively away from descriptive naturalism, there is never any sense that he is slighting his human subjects. Instead, he sought always to find the details that made individuals instantly recognisable to themselves and to others.”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: The Guardian
8. Qualified artist
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: What does the change to the meaning of words over time reveal about society?
Description: “We all need them, but some, like me, love words, and the mind feast they bring. But while words shape our lives, few grasp the weird way they work… Words “won't—and can't—sit still (like, literally),” declares John McWhorter (Words On The Move).”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: Big Think
Also included in August's premium newsletter...
7 more big real life situations, prompting us to ask -
The Premium TOK Newsletter
The new TOK newsletter presentation
The prmium newsletter now comes accompanied by a Google Slides Presentation. This features all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To see a sample of the presentation, featuring the first of the stories from October, click on the image below, then select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder, and then make any changes to suit whatever you are currently covering in TOK.
We hope you and your students enjoy this new addition to the TOK newsletter!
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2016 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
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explore September's key events & issues?
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the September edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
For the very first time, this month's premium newsletter comes accompanied by a Google Slides presentation, enabling you to explore each story in a more convenient and visual way. Each RLS is presented on two slides, the first providing an introduction and image of story, and the second featuring an animated 'looking inside' slide, to help you to explore it in your class. We've provided a sample of this presentation with RLS number 1.
We are also releasing a brilliant and unique new resource for IB Diploma History - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP). Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new Historical Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Download a free sample of the HIP
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we present the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. If you would like to receive all the RLSs in this format, plus 7 additional 'big' RLSs and 5 'quick' RLSs, as well as the Google Slides presentation for the newsletter, upgrade to the premium newsletter by hitting the button below.
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1. Is knowledge still power?
AoKs/WoKs: The nature of knowledge, human sciences, technology
First order KQs: How has Google become one of the world’s most important companies?
Second order KQs: Are we becoming more ‘meta-ignorant’, and what are the implications of this? Is thinking less important than it used to be?
Description: “Does knowledge matter any more? There’s a decent case that it doesn’t. In the 1950s economist Anthony Downs coined the concept of rational ignorance. In many situations, Downs observed, learning isn’t worth the bother. Most of us don’t learn car repair or medicine or accounting. Instead, we consult professionals when such expertise is needed – and that’s perfectly reasonable. Today, we’re outsourcing memory and knowledge to the internet. This is often a good thing, but it comes with a drawback. The cloud is making us meta-ignorant: unaware of what we don’t know.”
Discussion points and exploration: Many articles are currently being written asking the question of whether Google has made ‘ordinary’ knowledge redundant. Why do we really need to know anything when we can just Google it? This article does cover that, but it also goes a little further. It asks: is Google making us ignorant of what we don’t actually know in the first place - and, therefore, what we need to learn in order to overcome our deficiencies?
Google Slides presentation: Follow this link. Select the 'Make a copy' option to download your own version to Google Drive.
Source: The Guardian
2. Collective amnesia
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, memory, history
KQs: Do fictional representations of events provide us with accurate insights into our feelings towards those events?
Description: “now, 15 years after 9/11, it feels like there’s a certain lack of self-awareness, perhaps because really looking back and scrutinizing the attacks and their fallout is too difficult for some people to bear. The result is a collective amnesia so prevalent that a huge slice of the population doesn’t even remember supporting the invasion of Iraq in the first place — or, by extension, how profoundly both the culture and the popular media we consumed changed in such a short amount of time. If we trace the metamorphosis of our pop cultural depictions of 9/11 in the 15 years that have passed since the tragedy, direct attempts to cope with the attacks eventually evolve into allegorical attempts. But depictions of 9/11 have not slowed or even stopped; merely changed shapes.”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Vox
3. Elusive dots
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, sense perception
KQs: Why do we find visual illusions so interesting?
Description: “Optical illusions might be one of the internet’s favourite things. And it just got a brand new one: a strange picture of overlapping grids that provides the ultimate combination of frustration and joy. The new illusion looks simple, showing intersecting grey lines on a white background. But looking closely starts it moving – and though there are actually 12 black dots in it, it’s only possible to see a few of them at each time.”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Independent
4. A moral education
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics
KQs: How do we acquire our ethical knowledge?
Description: “A couple of years ago, I taught a freshman English course in a suburban-rural school district with 32 students, 30 of whom were 15-year-old boys. I tried passionately to teach the need to “walk a mile in another man’s shoes,” as extolled by Atticus Finch, yet I continued to overhear racist and homophobic comments. One student even said, “That’s what guns are for” when I asked the class how they dealt with people who held different beliefs than they did.”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
5. Body detox
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, reason, language
KQs: Why do we believe that ‘detox’ products are beneficial?
Description: “The idea can be traced all the way back to the Garden of Eden: Almost as soon as we were created, we ate a toxic apple. Since then, perhaps to atone for this original sin, many of us have fallen prey to the idea that we are full of nasty, usually nebulously defined toxins in our bodies and we need to get rid of them to be purer, cleaner, and lighter.”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Vox
6. The instant
AoKs/WoKs: The nature of knowledge, natural and human sciences, mathematics
KQs: How does perception define the way we understand ‘instantaneous’?
Description: “How short is an “instant”? Is it a second? A tenth of a second? A microsecond? You might think all of these qualify. What about 100 years? That certainly doesn’t seem like an instant, and to a human being, it isn’t, since we’d be lucky to have a lifespan that long. But to a giant sequoia, say, 100 years is no big deal. And in geological terms it’s practically nothing. How should we make sense of the idea of an instant? Does it cloud our judgment when we make decisions, both as individuals and as a society?”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Conversation
7. Ethical tongue
AoKs/WoKs: Language, ethics, human sciences
KQs: How does our language determine our ethical identity?
Description: “What defines who we are? Our habits? Our aesthetic tastes? Our memories? If pressed, I would answer that if there is any part of me that sits at my core, that is an essential part of who I am, then surely it must be my moral center, my deep-seated sense of right and wrong. And yet, like many other people who speak more than one language, I often have the sense that I’m a slightly different person in each of my languages — more assertive in English, more relaxed in French, more sentimental in Czech. Is it possible that, along with these differences, my moral compass also points in somewhat different directions depending on the language I’m using at the time?”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Salon
8. So Liddat Lor
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: What is the difference between a language, a dialect, and slang?
Description: “Singlish is the unofficial language – or dialect? or slang? – of Singapore, born out of the contact between the several cultures that make up the city state. It’s a living example of how languages can change and develop. It is also an expression of the Singaporean character and culture, a national treasure – or a detriment and danger to the country, depending on whom you ask.”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: BBC
Also included in August's premium newsletter...
7 more big real life situations, prompting us to ask -
Upgrade to the Premium TOK Newsletter
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion (complete edition)
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2016 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
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explore July's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the July edition of the theoryofknowledge.net newsletter
Because it’s the beginning of the new academic year for many schools around the world, we'd like to help you kick off your TOK lessons in style, by providing you with the premium version of the newsletter as a gift. You’ll find fifteen engaging real life situations, discussion points to provide a focus for exploration, and possible knowledge questions related to them (including a comparison of first and second order KQs). We also offer a fully-resourced knowledge controversy, centred around a man who is proving to be an invaluable asset to TOK classes around the world.
If you’d like to continue to receive the premium newsletter, as well as having access to back issues all the way back to November 2014 (providing you with more than 400 different RLSs), then follow this link to our resources shop, where you can find out more and purchase a subscription for your school.
We’d also like to remind you that our new TOK Sessions Pack is available for download. This is our biggest resource for teaching TOK, comprising well over 100 lesson plans on all aspects of the course, including an introduction to the course, the nature of knowledge, and support on writing the TOK essay and designing the presentation.
Every lesson plan within the teaching pack includes a starter activity, a clearly defined lesson objective, assessment tasks, and a PowerPoint to accompany ideas being covered. You can also purchase an extra Learning Pack, which provides a student handout for every session, a cover sheet for all the elements of the course, a list of sample knowledge questions, and key ideas and thinkers. You can download a free sample of the pack, which includes 5 different sessions, here, and find out more about how to purchase the pack here.
News stories & knowledge questions
1. Consequences of bias
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, reason, intuition, memory
First order KQs: How many people on both ‘sides’ have died as a result of problems between the police and civilians this year in the USA?
Second order KQs: What are the implications of confirmation bias? Which way of knowing is responsible for our ‘first impressions’? How can we overcome confirmation bias?
Description: “Alton Sterling and Philando Castile were shot to death by police officers this week. Both were calm… Underneath the ugliness and tragedy of their deaths is the fact that the officers who killed them made the decision to do so in a split-second -- based entirely on implicit biases… implicit bias -- an unintentional action rooted in prejudicial cognitive bias -- causes more trouble than it sounds like it should. It’s the root part of your brain that assesses everything you absorb from the world around you -- smells, tastes, people, feelings -- and categorizes them into experiences -- good, bad, scary, happy -- for easy recall.”
Discussion points and exploration: As with any major human sciences problem, the violence that is occurring in the United States between police and civilians is something that we are desperately trying to explain. Theories abound - the breakdown of morality in society, the increase of fear amongst ordinary people, the inadequate police training, the amount of guns in circulation and accessible to anyone who wants them. This article looks at a more elemental reason for what’s happening: our natural biases that may have helped early humans to survive, but now act detrimentally to divide society. Is this the key reason for explaining what’s going on? Can we overcome these biases?
Source: Big Think
2. Anybody out there?
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, natural sciences
First order KQs: What are the popular theories that UFOs exist?
Second order KQs: Why do people believe in the theories that UFOs exist? Is our need to believe in something more potent than our ability to be rational about issues? Is truth about potential or actual realities?
Description: “One thing the World UFO Day people are not is po-faced. They have some ideas on their website about how you can celebrate today, including making your own UFO t-shirts, taking pictures of strange objects in the sky (hey, if it’s going to happen on any day…) and throwing a UFO spotting party. It’s all rather jolly and has a bit of a Eurovision “guilty pleasure” vibe to it – though the exhortation to “create original-looking UFOs out of frisbees” doesn’t seem quite to be in the spirit of proving beyond a doubt the existence of alien life-forms.”
Discussion points and exploration: ‘UFOlogy’ is a huge industry, spawning books, TV series, films, and countless conspiracy theories. However, there are two ways of viewing ‘UFOlogists’ first, as people who have created a reality for themselves based on the desire to believe in something, rather than credible evidence. Second, as open-minded people for whom truth is as much about potential than it is about actual reality. There’s definitely scope for a class debate here!
Source: The Independent
3. Myth and reality
AoKs/WoKs: The nature of knowledge (etc.)
First order KQs: What are the most common misconceptions we hold about the world?
Second order KQs: Why do we have so many misconceptions about the world?
Description: “Thanks to the gods of the internet, a helpful soul has arisen and created for us a comprehensive chart of some of the frequently encountered “facts” and what they are in reality. Put together by the data journalist and information designer David McCandless, the chart chronicles research into the most common misconceptions or “myth conceptions” as he calls it.” [from Big Think]
Discussion points and exploration: This project by the ‘information is beautiful’ website is a lovely introduction to our knowledge in general, and leads on very effectively to a discussion of where and how we develop misconceptions about the world. How many misconceptions do students have? Which ones are most common? What’s causing us to develop such a skewed understanding of certain areas?
Source: Information is Beautiful
4. Looks tasty
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception
First order KQs: Which colours are associated with which tastes?
Second order KQs: Is taste dependent on vision? To what extent do the senses operate independently of each other? Does vision help or hinder taste?
Description: “Studies have proven that colour plays a vital role in setting our expectations of taste and flavour in foods. But what happens when colour defies expectation? We put food colouring into vanilla yoghurt and challenged people to guess the flavour. Will they all be duped or might someone see through our ruse?”
Discussion points and exploration: Not only does this help us to explore the limitations of our sense of taste (for a sense that plays such an important part in providing meaning to life, it is very easily misled), it also prompts us to explore the extent to which knowledge provided by sense perception is shaped by culture. This should be a surprise, given that we think of the senses as being one of the ‘rawer’ ways of knowing, but the experiment seems to suggest otherwise...
Source: The Guardian
5. Art vs materialism
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, human sciences
First order KQs: How did Michael Landy destroy all of his possessions?
Second order KQs: Do we see art “through the prism of our current concerns”? Does the meaning of art depend on who is looking at it?
Description: “We see artworks through the prism of our current concerns,” explains James Lingwood, who commissioned Break Down, and has just celebrated 25 brilliant years as co-director of Artangel. “The insistent pressures on people to consume have become more and more present in our culture, and there is an increasing feeling of discomfort about how alienating these pressures can be. Michael, through Break Down, put his finger on a deeply troubling part of our contemporary condition.”
Discussion points and exploration: The perennial ‘what is art’ question can be explored through countless paintings, musical compositions, and sculptures. But what really tests our definition is by looking at conceptual or performance art, like Michael Landy’s. This story also raises the question of the relationship between the artist and the audience, and the role of the latter in defining and giving meaning to what the artist creates. How many different interpretations of ‘Break Down’ will your students have?
Source: BBC
6. Mass of the soul
AoKs/WoKs: Religious knowledge systems, natural sciences
First order KQs: How has our conception of ‘the soul’ developed over time?
Second order KQs: Why do some people seek to use scientific methods to demonstrate religious phenomena?
Description: “In 1901, one of the most famous metaphysical experiments of the 20th century was performed by a Massachusetts physician. His name was Duncan MacDougall, and he believed that, if the soul were real, it should have measurable weight. He therefore attempted to compare the weights of patients before and after death. After testing six patients dying of tuberculosis, he concluded that dying results in the small but measurable loss of ¾ of an ounce – the weight of the soul.”
Discussion points and exploration: The question of whether humans have a soul, and therefore consist of two distinct entities (physical and spiritual) has kept philosophers busy for a long time. This article looks at that famous test carried out in 1901 that sought to settle the debate with scientific proof. Although it seems rather clumsy and naive now, it nonetheless prompts us to consider the way in which metaphysical questions are explored, and whether we can draw on one area of knowledge to offer an insight into another distinct and often contradictory one.
Source: The Conversation
7. Trending science
AoKs/WoKs: Technology, human and natural sciences
First order KQs: How widespread is the reporting of science by social media?
Second order KQs: Does social media help us to communicate, or prevent us from accurately conveying knowledge?
Description: “The problem is that social media is also a great way to spread misinformation, too. Millions of Americans shape their ideas on complex and controversial scientific questions – things like personal genetic testing, genetically modified foods and their use of antibiotics – based on what they see on social media. Even many traditional news organizations and media outlets report incomplete aspects of scientific studies, or misinterpret the findings and highlight unusual claims. Once these items enter into the social media echo chamber, they’re amplified. The facts become lost in the shuffle of competing information, limited attention or both.”
Discussion points and exploration: Given the prominence of social media in disseminating the news, we should never stop questioning the effect it has on the accuracy of what is being reported. This article focuses on journalism related to science, which arguably requires even more objectivity than other areas, but which is being affected in much the same way as them, with reliability being sacrificed for immediacy. Should science be reported in this way? How can we prevent inaccuracies creeping into the reporting of science?
Source: The Conversation
8. Art and ambiguity
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, human sciences
First order KQs: What are the key themes of poetry?
Second order KQs: How does poetry help us to understand the ambiguity of the world?
Description: “...poetry shows us that the world is “Crazier and more of it than we think,/Incorrigibly plural”, as Louis MacNeice writes in “Snow”; but it also allows us the consolations of a formal pattern that means nothing beyond itself. The form of a rhyming couplet can allude to its hundreds upon hundreds of predecessors; it can imply the poet’s technical training; it can even mime the “coupling” of lovers, as when they “get together” at the end of a sonnet or a sestina. But it does not itself mean anything.”
Discussion points and exploration: Although it’s not perhaps novel to view the arts in general, and poetry in particular, as sources of knowledge about existence and being, this article looks at the form of poetry, as well as its themes, in helping us to understand the world. Is it right in claiming that it helps us to grasp the unpredictability and ambiguity of the world? If so, should everyone draw more on poetry in order to relate better to others, and develop a more accepting approach to life?
Source: New Humanist
9. Conflict of diagnosis
AoKs/WoKs: Human and natural sciences
First order KQs: What is ‘environmental illness’?
Second order KQs: How should we decide whether ‘environmental illness’ exists? Who is the authority on the way our minds and bodies work: us, or the medical industry? How can we tell where the line is between hypochondria and illness?
Description: “A lot of things caused Susie pain: scented products, pesticides, plastic, synthetic fabrics, smoke, electronic radiation – the list went on. Back in “the regular world”, car exhaust made her feel sick for days. Perfume gave her seizures. Then she uprooted to Snowflake, Arizona. “I got out of the car and didn’t need my oxygen tank,” she said, grinning at me in the rearview mirror. “I could walk.”
Discussion points and exploration: This is a fascinating story, which does not, perhaps, initially seem to link strongly to TOK. But the more you read about and listen to the story of the residents of Snowflake, you realise there is a big debate being waged here - about who should decide on the legitimacy of a medical condition. Should it be the people who claim to suffer from it, and sense its presence directly? Or the scientific community, who require other forms of evidence before they accept that it is real?
Source: The Guardian
10. Everyday morality
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, human sciences
First order KQs: What were David Hume’s key philosophical ideas?
Second order KQs: Is our judgement of what represents ‘correct’ behaviour based on normality?
Description: “In a series of studies, psychologist Andrei Cimpian and I investigated why people use the status quo as a moral codebook – a way to decipher right from wrong and good from bad. Our inspiration for the project was philosopher David Hume, who pointed out that people tend to allow the status quo (“what is”) to guide their moral judgment… Just because a behavior or practice exists, that doesn’t mean it’s good – but that’s exactly how people often reason.”
Discussion points and exploration: The key question at the centre of this article is where we gain our moral code from, and how we decide what is the ‘right’ way of behaving. Specifically, it looks at how this is strongly influenced by what we judge as being ‘normal’, without weighing up whether ‘normal’ behaviour is ethically valid or not. Does this prove that we are lazy moralists? Can it shed light on why so many of us are unwilling to contribute to charity, support people in need of help, and view with suspicion those whose experiences are dissimilar to our own?
Source: The Conversation
11. Reasonable odds?
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, human sciences, ethics
First order KQs: What is ‘lottery addiction’?
Second order KQs: Why do people spend money on lottery tickets? Do we make our decisions based on reason?
Description: “The chances of winning the US lottery are 250 million to one, and in some cases higher. It’s not a small game of poker against some friends, instead it’s gambling against every citizen who buys a ticket. And perhaps it’s not much; two dollars to play each time. But the money adds up, and there are even cases of lottery addiction.”
Discussion points and exploration: This is a quick video that deals with the phenomenon of people who play the lottery. Given that the chances of winning are basically negligible, and that handing over your money for a ticket is akin to throwing it away, why do people take part?
Source: Big Think
12. Political projections
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
First order KQs: What are Donald Trump’s key political ideas?
Second order KQs: To what extent do we project our own ideology onto the politicians we have chosen to support?
Description: “Every successful politician succeeds by acting, to some degree, by allowing themselves to look like a blank screen on which a wide range of voters can project their own hopes and dreams. The clumsier politicians risk the appearance of pandering. Smoother ones manage to simply stay vague enough to convince voters they’re with them, although that can cause problems later.”
Discussion points and exploration: Donald Trump is a godsend to TOK teachers, and the more bizarre his comments become, the more he becomes an integral part of the way we explore reason, emotion, language, human sciences, and other aspects of the course. This article looks at how his supporters construct their own reality of what he stands for and represents, by projecting their own ideology onto what he stands for. Does this explain how politics works in general? Or is Trump unique in this respect, just as he seems unique in others?
Source: The Atlantic
13. Wish fulfilment
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, religious knowledge systems, humans sciences, emotion
First order KQs: How do con artists trick their victims?
Second order KQs: To what extent are belief systems based on need? What role does cause and effect play in how we try to understand the world?
Description: “The world is often arbitrary in its motions, and there isn’t always meaning to be found. This gap in meaning is where con artist, cult leaders and spiritual advisors walk in. [Maria] Konnikova [popular psychology writer] has spoken before about con artists, and how they work. One big thing she pointed out is that con artists listen, and “solve” people’s problems by giving them what they desire.”
Discussion points and exploration: Why people should subsume their own identities and beliefs within a cult or religious group is a fascinating question. Konnikova provides a nice guide to techniques used by such organisations, and compares their strategies with those of a con artist. How widely can we apply this analysis?
Source: Big Think
14. Seeing is believing
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, sense perception, human sciences
First order KQs: What part has social media played in widening of the police killings scandal in the USA?
Second order KQs: Why do we need to see an ethical issue in order to truly understand it?
Description: “What makes these deaths [Philando Castile and Alton Sterling] different—what makes them subjects of public grief, warranting a Facebook post from the president—is that they were filmed. Alton Sterling and Philando Castile became news not because of the uniqueness of what happened to them, but because a camera documented their suffering and death. Journalists, lawmakers, and the public see the footage, and they believe.”
Discussion points and exploration: In some ways, this RLS has a lot in common with the concept at the heart of Peter Singer’s ethical immediacy idea (explained in his very moving TED talk) - in other words, it’s not enough to merely hear about a moral problem in order to act on it, we have to see or experience it for ourselves. With the advent of technology designed to facilitate communication via social media, we are now more easily able to do exactly this. It is well worth exploring the implications of this technology - will it enhance or inhibit our understanding of ethical issues and events going on in the world?
Source: The Atlantic
15. The new language
AoKs/WoKs: Language, intuition, technology
First order KQs: How have emojis developed over the last 5 years?
Second order KQs: Do emojis represent a new language?
Description: “Like many people who are fond of texting, I spend a lot of time hunting for the perfect emoji. Although I’m particularly fond of the “loudly crying face” 😭 and fire 🔥 emojis, it’s often hard to find an image that precisely captures how I feel, especially in the moments I need one the most; when I’m feeling exhausted or angry or insecure, I usually don’t want to spend 10 minutes scrolling neurotically through over a thousand images to determine whether an upside-down smiley face or a taco best represents my emotional state. Thanks in part to the massive popularity of emojis, several tech companies are exploring ways not only to make finding emojis easier, but to predict which ones you may want to use.”
Discussion points and exploration: We’ve explored stories before on emojis, but the sophistication with which they are being used is advancing so quickly that it really seems like they offer us a whole new way of communicating with each other. Why are they so popular - is it because people are too lazy to communicate using the more laborious process of writing? Or is it because they are superior to words in expressing emotions and ideas?
Source: Five Thirty Eight
Quick stories
E1. Problems of cutenessAoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
KQs: To what extent is our behaviour influenced by ‘cuteness’?
Source: The Independent
E2. The job of the artist
AoKs/WoKs: The arts
KQs: What is the job of the artist?
Source: Big Think
E3. Closet philosophyAoKs/WoKs: H.sciences, s.perception
KQs: Where is the line between neuroscience and philosophy?
Source: Big Think
E4. Death metalAoKs/WoKs: The arts, human sciences
KQs: How does heavy metal help us to cope with mortality?
Source: The Independent
E5. Curious instinct
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion
KQs: Are curiosity and happiness mutually exclusive?
Source: The Guardian
Knowledge controversies
Click on the image to take you to the video. Watch from 5.55 - 8.51.
Should political leaders use arguments based on logic?
One of the most useful aspects of the TOK course is the training it gives students on constructing arguments. The basis of arguing or debating effectively is using objective evidence to justify opinions, rather than relying on assertions that are based on logical fallacies. Understanding what a logical fallacy is can be an epoch-making event for many students, and identifying them in everyday conversations, the sales pitches of advertising campaigns, and the rhetoric of politicians’ speeches is an immensely empowering skill.
We have, arguably, never before lived in a time when logical fallacies are so prevalent. Entire political campaigns are built on them, in all countries of the world (see our take on Brexit from last month), but given the importance of US elections, it’s worth looking at what’s happening there. Although logical fallacies are found within speeches and promises made by both parties, we are going to focus on the GOP.
Based on the excellent YouTube Channel Teach Argument, we present the speech given by Donald Trump announcing his decision to stand as the presidential nominee for the Republican Party. Although this runs for around 45 minutes, you only need to watch the first three minutes of the speech, from 5.55 - 8.51. The task for students is simple: identify how many logical fallacies are used during this section of the speech.
Follow this link for an outline of different fallacies (all of them, except - perhaps surprisingly - the ad hominem fallacy appear during the three minutes; although you can find a good example of that one during a debate against Jeb Bush here),this link for a transcript of the three minutes, and this link for where the logical fallacies appear.
Follow up tasks could include a consideration of whether it matters - does the construction of an argument based on ad hominem attacks, slippery slope reasoning, and appeals to emotion disqualify a person from high office? What are the ethical implications of the increase in use of logical fallacies? What does it say about our education system that logical fallacies are increasingly accepted or not spotted by people? Should we train students more in debate and argument?
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Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
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TED Companion (complete edition)
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
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explore February's news events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resources educate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the February edition of the theoryofknowledge.net premium newsletter.
March represents that ‘handover’ month in TOK when Northern hemisphere schools submit their essays, and Southern hemisphere schools receive the six prescribed titles, so we wish students at both ends of the writing process the very best of luck.
This month’s knowledge controversy, found in the premium newsletter, is about accessibility to knowledge, particularly that related to science. We invite subscribers to think about the pros and cons of making scientific research more available via the Internet, and the implications of this on our understanding of the world.
We’ll soon be announcing the release of our two newest resources: Great Minds on TOK, and the New TOK Sessions. As the size and scope of both of them has grown beyond our original plans, we’ve pushed back the publication date, but they should be coming out at the end of this month or early in April.
In the meantime, you might like to check out new resources offered by our friends at Cambridge University Press, in particular, their unique CAS course book. Find out more here.
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News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we provide our first real life situation as it is presented in the premium newsletter. The premium newsletter also includes 12 extra RLSs, and other features to help students engage with TOK. To upgrade your subscription, hit the button below.
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1. The study of ignorance
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, the nature of knowledge, language, history
Could also be used in: Subjects within Individuals and societies, and Sciences
First order KQs: What does ‘agnotology’ mean?
Second order KQs: How do we distinguish between balanced debate, and the deliberate spread of ignorance? What conditions are needed for the spread of ignorance?
Description: “agnotology… comes from agnosis, the neoclassical Greek word for ignorance or ‘not knowing’, and ontology, the branch of metaphysics which deals with the nature of being. Agnotology is the study of wilful acts to spread confusion and deceit, usually to sell a product or win favour.”
Discussion points: The real life situation at the heart of this article is about Robert Proctor, and his attempt to explore the history of agnotology. His story tells us a great deal about the search for knowledge, and the way in which big companies, and other agencies, often try to prevent us from doing this successfully. It’s interesting to us for what it says about the methods of ‘spreading ignorance’ - look, for example, at how the ‘disagreement of experts’ is used as a way of creating a ‘false picture of truth’.
Further exploration: An obvious extension task would be to find further examples of how big companies and political groups have used these techniques to spread information. Start with tobacco firms, move on to climate change deniers, and finish up with looking at the presidential primaries. Do you agree, overall, with his analysis that ‘ignorance is power’, or, that ‘knowledge is accessible but not accessed’?
Source: BBC
2. Ethical arts
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, ethics
KQs: What role do the arts play in shaping our ethical outlooks?
Description: “In one of her final interviews, given in 1964, Harper Lee, who has died at the age of 89, explained: “I would like to leave some record of the kind of life that existed in a very small world. I hope to do this in several novels: to chronicle something that seems to be very quickly going down the drain. This is small-town middle-class southern life ... I believe that there is something universal in this little world, something decent to be said for it, and something to lament in its passing.””
For discussion points, further exploration, and other subjects related to this: Upgrade here to our premium newsletter!
Source: The Guardian
3. Information war
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, reason, emotion, intuition
KQs: Why are rational explanations often less attractive than irrational ones?
Description: “As scientists race for answers about the Zika virus and its links to neurological disorders, rumours are filling the vacuum. Genetically modified (GM) mosquitoes, expired vaccines and more recently, the use of larvicide to stop mosquitoes from breeding, have all been blamed. Posts on social media expressing these theories have been widely shared - although rarely by respected scientists. And Brazil's health authorities have been caught off guard, describing the frenzy as a "real information war" with a "complex scenario of actors, interests and worldviews".
For discussion points, further exploration, and other subjects related to this: Upgrade here to our premium newsletter!
Source: BBC
4. Memory restoration
AoKs/WoKs: Memory
KQs: What are the ethical (and psychological) implications of remembering everything?
Description: “...forgetting isn’t just a loss that comes with age. It’s a normal part of the memory process. We don’t need to remember a lot of what happens to us – what we made for dinner two years ago, where we left the car the last five times we parked in this lot. Those are examples of things that aren’t useful to remember anymore.”
For discussion points, further exploration, and other subjects related to this: Upgrade here to our premium newsletter!
Source: The Conversation
5. Sound in history
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception, history, the arts
KQs: Do we neglect a consideration of sense perception when we study the past?
Description: “The music of the Byzantine era, she decided, was a key to understanding her area of expertise—and not just the music itself, but understanding the experience of hearing it, and what it would have been like 700 years ago. “As an art historian, I could look at the pictures and say, ‘this is a nice painting of the hymn,’ but I couldn’t say anything about how the audience perceived that painting within a ritual setting.”
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Source: The Atlantic
6. Spelling and identity
AoKs/WoKs: Language, history
KQs: Do dictionaries stifle self-expression?
Description: “How we turn thoughts and experiences into speech and text will always be idiosyncratic. It used to be more so: people wrote as they spoke, so variation in dialect begat variation in text. With the printing press came partial standardisation. We don’t call eggs eyren, but it could easily have been otherwise. English after Caxton was gradually codified but remained heterogeneous and subject to constant change and stresses. That it drifted more in spoken than written form is another reason for the disparity between its spelling and pronunciation.”
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Source: History Today
7. Subjectivity of pain
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception
KQs: Is pain a subjective or objective experience?
Description: “How badly affected someone is by a health issue depends on how it is perceived by the individual, and there are so many things that can influence this, even if it’s quite an obvious physical issue. Take pain, the most obvious problem resulting from a physical health issue. How do you measure, objectively, how much pain someone is in?”
For discussion points, further exploration, and other subjects related to this: Upgrade here to our premium newsletter!
Source: The Guardian
8. Imagination versus science
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, natural sciences
KQs: Can science be used to understand the arts?
Description: “Seeing such things in art is what we do when we go to galleries; it is a subjective and subtle process of discovery. Now that relationship has been short-circuited by misused science. To “prove” by chemical analysis of his colours that Van Gogh’s expressive art reflects his evolving (and after 1888, downwardly spiralling) moods is pompously to state as a scientific discovery what any sensitive beholder can see for themselves. In fact, it is more dangerous than that because this kind of clumsy use of new research technologies erodes our ability to look for ourselves.”
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Source: The Guardian
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
7 more detailed real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
... and 5 ‘quick’ real life situations, helping you to consider:
We also consider another essential contemporary knowledge controversy, with links to articles outlining the position of both sides, key figures involved, and questions on the implications of the debate.
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An introduction to the areas of knowledge
Our second video for Cambridge University Press, briefly introducing the areas of knowledge, can be seen by clicking on the image below.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
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The TOK Sessions Pack
The awesome TOK Sessions pack is now being used by hundreds of educators around the world to deliver the TOK course, and help students understand the assessment tasks.
The pack contains 85 lesson plans for all the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing, introductory lessons on TOK, plenary sessions for the end of the course, and suggestions on how to explain the essay and presentation.
Purchase the TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion (complete edition)
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companions
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
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Using TOK to understand January's news
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the January edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
Welcome to January premium TOK newsletter. There has been a great deal in the press during the last month about the coverage of scientific issues, and the reliability of reporting of this area of knowledge, so we include coverage of several of these stories.
After positive feedback from subscribers, we continue this month to provide a suggestion in the premium newsletter for which IB Diploma subjects each RLS would work well in. So if you’re a TOK or IBDP coordinator, have a quick look through the second section of the RLSs this month, and pass on the stories you think other teachers might be able to use, both as a way of promoting TOK throughout your school, and as a way of enriching other classes.
Our app for both iOS and Android is available by following the links below.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we provide our first real life situation as it is presented in the premium newsletter. The premium newsletter also includes 12 extra RLSs, and other features to help students engage with TOK. To upgrade your subscription, hit the button below.
Upgrade to the premium subscription
1. Imagination versus research
AoKs/WoKs: History, imagination, the arts, reason, emotion
Can also be used in: History, Studies in language and literature
First order KQs: How do societal trends affect the way we gather historical knowledge? Why does the way historians work change over time?
Second order KQs: Is imagination a valid way of knowing for the historian? Can fictional accounts of the past provide us with real knowledge? Does historical enquiry have to be based on extensive research?
Description: “How do historians justify what they do? Certainly they can no longer pretend to Olympian distance and uninterested authority. We are all a product of the times we live in, fed by the oxygen of our experiences, and it is disingenuous to claim otherwise. We live in a multi-channel, multi-vocal era, which is sceptical of singularity and authority, but paradoxically attracted to narrow certainties and averse to self-doubt. How should historians adapt their practice to reflect these competing tensions?”
Discussion points: The nature of history is often one debated between those who argue it is more of an art, and those who argue it is a science. Although it undoubtedly borrows approaches from both these areas of knowledge, the heart of the question concerns the extent to which we need to ‘fill in the gaps’ using our imagination. Is this valid if we want to access the truth about the past? Or should those gaps be left if there isn’t enough solid evidence to allow us to explore them? And how does this fit in with our ‘multi-channel, multi-vocal era’?
Further exploration: Compare and contrast the way in which history used to be written (by consulting works written 50 years ago or more), and how it is today. What are the key differences? Why is this? How has history changed as a result of the Internet, and methods of communicating knowledge about the past? Think in terms of the ways of knowing that are used in order to access historical knowledge.
Source: History Today
2. Best countries on earth?
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, mathematics
KQs: What are the limits of statistics in terms of providing us with knowledge?
Description: “Just as we have done with universities, hospitals and other institutions, our Best Countries portal will be a global homepage for stories and data to help citizens, business leaders and governments evaluate performance in a rapidly changing world,” Mortimer B. Zuckerman, chairman and editor-in-chief of U.S. News, said in a statement. The publication is known the world over for many of its rankings.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Independent
3. Emotional labels
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, language
KQs: Does labelling an emotion allow us to control it?
Description: “Unusual emotions routinely swirl within us, and they aren't easily named. But it may be useful to stop, examine them, and try to put them into words. "When we label an emotion, it might make it more manageable," says Seth J. Gillihan, a clinical assistant professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. "It might not change the emotion, but it does allow us the possibility of choosing our response."
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: Psychology Today
4. Mathematical science
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, mathematics, sense perception
KQs: Which provides more certain knowledge: mathematics, or sense perception?
Description: “The scientists who made headlines this week by announcing evidence for a new planet in our solar system are basing the claim entirely on a mathematical model. Nobody’s seen the thing, but the math says it’s there. This isn’t the first time scientists have found a new planet before really finding it, but this technique also has produced outright blunders. This time, though, astronomers say there’s reason to take the new potential planet seriously.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: FiveThirtyEight
5. Cannabis and IQ
AoKs/WoKs: Natural & human sciences, ethics
KQs: At what point should we trust scientific data?
Description: “Whether or not using cannabis can lead to cognitive impairment is a hot topic of research and public interest. Given the extensive media attention granted to findings that suggest detrimental effects of cannabis on cognition, brain function andmental health, you would be forgiven for thinking smoking a spliff was akin to repeatedly bashing yourself over the head with a giant bong. However, since much of the work to date is cross-sectional (that is, measurements are taken only at one time in a person’s life), we cannot know whether cannabis users would have performed any differently before they started using cannabis. In short, we’re faced with a classic “chicken or egg” problem.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
6. Nutritional advice
AoKs/WoKs: Natural and human sciences
KQs: Should we trust the data produced by scientific surveys and questionnaires?
Description: “When it comes to nutrition, everyone has an opinion. What no one has is an airtight case. The problem begins with a lack of consensus on what makes a diet healthy. Is the aim to make you slender? To build muscles? To keep your bones strong? Or to prevent heart attacks or cancer or keep dementia at bay? Whatever you’re worried about, there’s no shortage of diets or foods purported to help you. Linking dietary habits and individual foods to health factors is easy — ridiculously so.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: FiveThirtyEight
7. There are more things in heaven and earth...
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, natural sciences, imagination, ethics
KQs: Can we rely on knowledge that is not supported by demonstrable evidence?
Description: “So if we can’t prove or disprove astrology by seeing predictions either play out or fail to materialize, how can we test it and trust it? “That question comes from our modern rational Western worldview that deems what’s true is based on data and scientific results,” says Cox. “Astrology is a symbolic system, it doesn’t operate within that Western framework and our astrologers aren’t trying to demonstrate that. There are other ways to be in the world.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Independent
8. Commercial science
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, ethics
KQs: What are the implications of the commercialization of university research?
Description: “As it turns out, the maker of Fifth Quarter Fresh chocolate milk — which comes from a dairy cooperative in Hagerstown, Maryland — funded 10 percent of the study, and the university funded the rest. So here we have a milk manufacturer working in partnership with the University of Maryland to fund a sloppy study, and the university then blasts the results, persuading schools and the press that this milk works wonders on students' brains.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: Vox
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
7 more detailed real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
... and 5 ‘quick’ real life situations, helping you to consider:
Upgrade to the premium newsletter by hitting the button below.
Upgrade to the premium TOK subscription
An introduction to the areas of knowledge
Our second video for Cambridge University Press, briefly introducing the areas of knowledge, can be seen by clicking on the image below.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The TOK Sessions Pack
The awesome TOK Sessions pack is now being used by hundreds of educators around the world to deliver the TOK course, and help students understand the assessment tasks.
The pack contains 85 lesson plans for all the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing, introductory lessons on TOK, plenary sessions for the end of the course, and suggestions on how to explain the essay and presentation.
Purchase the TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion (complete edition)
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companions
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2016 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
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December's news events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the December edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
Although Christmas is over for another year, we’re starting this month’s edition with a consideration of the story of the birth of Jesus, and the way in which we visualise and understand the events surrounding it. We also think about several other stories that are closely related to religious knowledge systems.
We believe that TOK should be taught in all Diploma subject classes, as well as in specific TOK ones, and arguably the best way to do this is by exploring current events and issues that form the basis of our real life situations. Starting this month, our premium newsletter provides a suggestion for which IB Diploma subjects each RLS would work well in, giving you another reason to upgrade from the free to premium subscription.
We are very proud to announce that we are working alongside the world’s newest and most innovative new university, Minerva Schools, to promote several exciting initiatives. Minerva students spend four years of immersive global study with students living in up to 7 different world cities, and are encouraged to draw on critical thinking to tackle complex challenges.
In recognition of the fact that their pedagogy resonates so strongly with TOK, and our approach to it, we’re delighted that Minerva has dedicated one full tuition needs-based scholarship to a theoryofknowledge.net user. To find out more, and apply, visit the Minerva theoryofknowledge.net scholarship here. You can read a new post written for us by a Minerva (and former UWC) student on how TOK has helped her in her first undergraduate year.
Finally, two Minerva students will be travelling from London to Istanbul this month, and meeting with international students along the way to present a range of workshops based on the refugee crisis. If you’d like them to visit your school, let us know.
Our app for both iOS and Android is available by following the links below.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we provide our first real life situation as it is presented in the premium newsletter. The premium newsletter also includes 12 extra RLSs, and other features. To upgrade your subscription, hit the button below.
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1. Dreaming of a white Christmas
AoKs/WoKs: Religious knowledge systems, faith, history, reason, ethics, human sciences
Could also be used in: World religions, Social and cultural anthropology, History
First order KQs: How do different religions present origins stories?
Second order KQs: Are historical accuracy and faith incompatible within the context of religious knowledge systems? Should biblical stories be subject to historical scrutiny?
Description: “Christmas, like many other holidays, is a social ritual informed by some mix of religion and folklore. As you’d expect, many popular depictions of Jesus’s birth are filled with inaccuracies that conflict with the story told in the Bible—the supposed presence of “three kings,” Jesus’s birth in a stable, a fair-skinned holy family. Some are relatively harmless—the understandable result of centuries of obfuscation, speculation, and artistic reinvention. But it’s also time to let others go, or to at least broadly acknowledge their divergence from history.”
Discussion points: The story of the birth of Jesus is central to Western culture, and the holiday that is held to mark it is celebrated in virtually all countries around the world, regardless of their religious (or non-religious) outlooks. However, there is a great deal of uncertainty about the actual events that we commemorate, and the story that most of us think we know is very different to that supported by the evidence. But does this matter? Is faith the only way of knowing we should employ when taking part in Christmas? Or is the imagery of Christmas sometimes ethically unsound?
Further exploration: There is a great deal of scope for further exploration here: looking at different religions and societies, students could think about why there is sometimes a conflict between faith and an insistence on historical accuracy, and the extent to which religious knowledge systems are founded on actual, well-documented events, or on stories that are more mythological in nature. Some religious leadersassert that faith and reason are not only compatible, but also essential - how does this view fit into the way in which we approach the Christmas story and the origins of Jesus?
Source: The Atlantic
2. Circle psychology
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
KQs: Can simple perceptive tests determine the answer to complex psychological questions?
Description: “A simple test has been devised that could determine your political outlook, according to a study. Researchers say those who see the shape above as a circle are more likely to have liberal political views. They say those people will probably be more inclined to want to help other humans and strongly support the idea of government aid for the homeless and unemployed.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: The Independent
3. History as empathy
AoKs/WoKs: History, emotion
KQs: Is the development of empathy “the quintessential underlying story of human history”?
Description: “Marx said that the fundamental driver of human history was the conflict between classes. Darwin believed it was the evolutionary struggle for survival. Others have claimed that the most important force for change is the clash of civilisations, the rise of political ideologies and religious movements, or advances in technology. A growing number of thinkers, however, are starting to recognise that empathy is an essential missing ingredient in these traditional narratives.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: New Humanist
4. One God?
AoKs/WoKs: Religious knowledge systems, faith
KQs: Do all religions have the same concept of God?
Description: “Do Muslims and Christians worship the same God? It’s a question that has bedeviled theologians and everyday believers for centuries. And this week it may have cost a tenured professor her job. Larycia Hawkins, an associate professor of political science at Wheaton College, was placed on administrative leave on Tuesday after suggesting that believers in the two faiths do indeed follow the same God.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
5. The Holy Bible
AoKs/WoKs: Religious knowledge systems, ethics, human sciences, emotion, reason
KQs: Why are we aware of other people’s prejudices more than our own?
Description: “A lot of conservative Christians like to argue, as do atheists, that the Qur’an is full of barbarism and misogyny. Unlike the atheists, though, they forget that their own Bible is also full of horrific verses.So the Dutch pranksters at Dit Is Normaalran an experiment. They bought a Bible, but changed the cover to say it’s the Qur’an. Then they asked people to read passages and give their thoughts.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: Patheos
6. Ethical responsibility of scientists
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, ethics
KQs: Do scientists have an ethical responsibility for how their knowledge is used?
Description: “...computer science has quite a bit to do with reality. Its practitioners devise the surveillance systems that watch over nearly every space, public or otherwise—and they design the tools that allow for privacy in the digital realm. Computer science is political, by its very nature. That’s at least according to Phillip Rogaway, a professor of computer science at the University of California. ...Last week, Rogaway took his case directly to a roomful of cryptographers at a conference in Auckland, New Zealand. He accused them of a moral failure: By allowing the government to construct a massive surveillance apparatus, the field had abused the public trust. Rogaway said the scientists had a duty to pursue social good in their work.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
7. Scientists with faith
AoKs/WoKs: Faith, natural sciences, religious knowledge systems
KQs: Is religious faith compatible with a scientific outlook?
Description: “...it has puzzled me how anyone could be religious whilst also being a scientist. How can one hold what I saw as diametrically opposed belief systems? How, on the one hand, could someone devote themselves to the scientific methods where, through repeated experimentation, one builds up a self-consistent representation of the rules that govern the universe, whilst on the other hand believing in a force that existed outside the rules and that, indeed, could change those rules.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: New Humanist
8. Language and emotion
AoKs/WoKs: Language, emotion, human sciences
KQs: To what extent is emotion culture-specific?
Description: “At the same time, though, our emotions are also shaped by the world around us, and different cultures collectively experience emotions in different ways. Korea, for example, has han, or the state of feeling sad and hopeful at the same time. Finland, Denmark, and Norway all have their own terms for the specific kind of coziness that comes from being warm on a cold day, surrounded by loved ones.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
What else comes in this month's PREMIUM NEWSLETTER?
7 more detailed real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
UPGRADE TO THE PREMIUM NEWSLETTER
An introduction to the areas of knowledge
Our second video for Cambridge University Press, briefly introducing the areas of knowledge, can be seen by clicking on the image below.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The TOK Sessions Pack
The awesome TOK Sessions pack is now being used by hundreds of educators around the world to deliver the TOK course, and help students understand the assessment tasks.
The pack contains 85 lesson plans for all the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing, introductory lessons on TOK, plenary sessions for the end of the course, and suggestions on how to explain the essay and presentation.
Purchase the TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion (complete edition)
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents TOK-related questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK concepts and ideas in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companions
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2016 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
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October's news events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the October edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
We’ve been busy updating the site, adding many extra features to the site, such asmore videos, more sections within the different ways of knowing and areas of knowledge, an array of new real life situations, and more profiles on key thinkers from the past and present.
We’ve also been in the news. Michael was interviewed by the BBC World Service for a story they were running on the South Korean history textbook controversy, and he gave his thoughts on the mutable nature of history, and how this is sometimes exploited by governments. The interview was picked up by ABC of Australia, and can be heard here; the BBC web version of the story is here.
The TED Companion 2 will be coming out in mid-November, with 40 brand new talks. You can buy this as a separate edition, or purchase the Complete TED Companion, containing an enormous 100 of the most TOK-friendly TED talks, presented in a lesson compatible format. This the perfect way to introduce or consolidate students’ knowledge of the course, as well as hooking them up with the most influential contemporary thinkers, and modern knowledge debates.
Our app for both iOS and Android is available by following the links below.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we provide our first real life situation as it is presented in the premium newsletter. The premium newsletter also includes 12 extra RLSs, and other features. If you would like to receive this version, please upgrade below.
1. Correct history
AoKs/WoKs: History, human sciences
First order KQs: What have been the key events of South Korean history?
Second order KQs: Who should be responsible for the writing of history? Is there a ‘correct version’ of what happened in the past? How accessible is the truth about the past?
Description: “South Korea's government has announced a controversial plan to replace a variety of history books with a single textbook approved by the state…. By 2017, The Correct History Textbook will be the only history book allowed in South Korea's high schools. It will be written by a government-appointed panel of history teachers and academics. Opposition politicians and some students have already been protesting against the move, accusing the government of "distorting history".”
Discussion points: The story highlights a clash of two completely different perspectives: that of the South Korean government, which believes that it is possible to access the ‘truth’ about the past, and build a history textbook around it, and those who believe that history is based on different interpretations, which often change and develop as society moves forward. Think also about what the story reveals in terms of the importance governments place on history, and how it should be delivered to school pupils.
Further exploration: It’s worth listening to the podcast, as it contains a BBC interview with theoryofknowledge.net’s creator, Michael Dunn. He and the other commentators, note how other countries often struggle to present to control how the past is presented - look into Japan and USA and how they approach this issue. On the other hand, some countries, such as the UK, choose to make their history less controversial, with ‘hero or villain’ activities applied to very distant figures from their history whose ethical impact is felt a lot less. Whose approach is the best?
Source: ABC (Australia)
2. Trolley morality
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics
KQs: Can hypothetical situations help us to understand moral decision-making?
Description: “Puzzling, ridiculous, and oddly irresistible, [the runaway trolley] scenario has profoundly shaped our understanding of right and wrong. In the past 40 years it has occupied the attention of brilliant minds, from academic ethicists to moral psychologists to engineers. It has helped them try to answer profound questions—how do we act, and how should we? But in its fifth decade, is the trolley problem starting to show its age?”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
3. Empathy Machine
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, technology, ethics, the arts
KQs: What role does empathy play in knowledge acquisition about the world?
Description: “Videogames are not only a way for an audience to experience a life outside their own, but also a powerful way for a person to invite others into one's own personal history and perspective, to not only view the story from the sidelines, but from the inside.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: Wired
4. Hip language
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: Is meaning hard-wired to words?
Description: “Hipsters are famous for their love of all things old-fashioned: 19th Century beards, pickle-making, Amish outerwear, naming their kids Clementine or Atticus. Now, they may be excavating archaic language, too. As Chi Luu points out at JSTOR Daily — the blog of a database of academic journals, what could be more hipster than that? — old-timey words like bespoke, peruse, smitten and dapper appear to be creeping back into the lexicon.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: Independent/Washington Post
5. Motivation and insight
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, human sciences, intuition
KQs: Is curiosity a prerequisite of knowledge acquisition?
Description: “People who are concrete thinkers aren't going to come up with the insights. People who are speculative, who engage in hypothetical as opposed to concrete reasoning, they're the ones that are likely to generate insights -- that's the personality difference. Curiosity is something that I've been wondering about recently, because curiosity seems to be one of the primary engines for insight.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: Wired
6. Selfish memory
AoKs/WoKs: Memory, human sciences, technology
KQs: What habits in the present ensure the retention of knowledge from the past?
Description: “Digital cameras remove us from the present. And afterwards, when we review the thousands of photos we’ve taken, they are just another thousand photos. They aren’t special. Instead of Mary reviewing dozens of photos that captured major parts of her life, imagine she had thousands. They would be meaningless. And the chances of her recalling anything related to those precious times in her life would be near zero. Capturing a colossal number of photos of any event is indirectly proportional to your ability recall the event later on. It cheapens it because you didn’t live the moment; you were too busy documenting it.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: Big Think
7. Issues of mortality
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, ethics, emotion
KQs: To what extent do people employ reason, rather than emotion, to form a position on issues such as the death penalty and abortion?
Description: “In Indiana, a woman who suffered a miscarriage and delivered a stillborn fetus was charged and convicted of both “feticide” and “felony neglect of a dependent”—despite the fact that the first crime requires terminating a pregnancy while the fetus is still in the womb while the latter requires delivering a live baby and then neglecting it. Logic doesn’t seem to matter when the state is trying to protect women’s bodies from their owners.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
8. Artificial emotional intelligence
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, technology, human sciences
KQs: Do we need help in making decisions involving emotional intelligence?
Description: “We need AEI rather badly because our emotional frailties dwarf our incapacities in raw mathematics or data management: we make extremely poor decisions about how we should manage relationships. We have little idea what job to focus on and when to quit. We don't know what to spend our money on. We get holidays wrong, have no clue how to repair friendships or handle tricky employees, and fumble as to how to reconcile with our parents.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: Wired
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
7 more detailed real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
... and 5 ‘quick’ real life situations, helping you to consider:
UPGRADE TO THE PREMIUM NEWSLETTER
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The TOK Sessions Pack
The awesome TOK Sessions pack is now being used by hundreds of educators around the world to deliver the TOK course, and help students understand the assessment tasks.
The pack contains 85 lesson plans for all the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing, introductory lessons on TOK, plenary sessions for the end of the course, and suggestions on how to explain the essay and presentation.
Purchase the TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companions
Our inspirational TED Companion Packs present TOK-related questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK concepts and ideas in an academic and social context.
The packs include a guide for teachers, student handouts, and a breakdown of each talk, allowing your students to engage with them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companions
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2015 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
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United Kingdom
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We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the September edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
Welcome to the September edition of the TOK newsletter. We've been developing quite a few new ideas and resources for TOK, and you can access some of them for free.
Our first video made in conjunction with Cambridge University Press has been released, and can be seen on YouTube. It introduces knowledge questions and real life situations, explaining their significance to TOK, and how to approach them in the essay and presentation. We’ll be releasing more over the next few months, covering many different aspects of the course.
We're also planning to release a whole range of exciting new TOK resources for the 2015-16 academic year, and these can be viewed in our resources brochure. These include an additional Sessions Pack, a second TED Companion, and an all new resource making the ideas and thoughts of philosophers more TOK-friendly.
If you’d like to introduce or consolidate TOK skills in your school, orwant to consider the 'bigger picture' of what we're doing, in a clear, engaging, and jargon-free way, our new student seminars and teacher workshops will be of interest to you. See the different topics and modules that we deliver here.
Our app for both iOS and Android is available by following the links below.
News stories & knowledge questions
1. Tabloid knowledge
We present the first of our RLSs in the same way it appears in the premium newsletter. Find out more details on subscriptionshere.
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences (journalism), emotion, reason, nature of knowledge
First order KQs: What characterises tabloid journalism?
Second order KQs: What the knowledge implications of news being reported in a contradictory way? Which ways of knowing are necessary to read between tabloid lines? What impact does a biased agenda have in terms of the reporting of ‘the truth’?
Description: “British tabloids, which have been scaremongering about refugees for years, telling Britons to fear and resist any immigration and helping to drive the UK's shameful anti-refugee policies, discovered their compassion for refugees on Wednesday when a small child's body washed up on a Turkish shore. The child was a Syrian refugee who, like many hundreds of other refugees, had died during the dangerous journey across the Mediterranean. A photo of the young boy went viral, and the same British tabloids that are overtly hostile to living refugees decided that this one was worth caring about, and have plastered their covers with his image.”
Discussion points: This is a great story for viewing the way in which tabloid journalism works (and, some would say, journalism in general). Driven by motives other than simply conveying the ‘truth’ about what is going on in the world, one finds completely different headlines and and reports of exactly the same events and issues going on in the world. Given the very high circulation figures of these papers, the knowledge implications of this are huge: most people who read a newspaper (either online, or printed) read a tabloid newspaper, so their knowledge of what is going on in the world is based on this approach to covering contemporary events. Does this mean that most people’s knowledge of the world is flawed? Do other sources of knowledge make up for this? Are serious (or ‘broadsheet’) newspapers and news sites better, or do they just market themselves more convincingly?
Further exploration: There’s a great deal of scope for further exploration here. Look at different tabloid news sites, and try to get a handle on their agenda. How does this affect the way they communicate knowledge? Should more to be done to try to force tabloids to approach journalism in a more accurate way?
Source: Vox
2. Importance of smell
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception, emotion, human sciences (psychology)
KQs: Why do we underrate the importance of knowledge provided to us by our olfactory sense?
Description: “Despite the various ways smell protects us, humans often count it as one of the senses they could do without. (In arecent study by McCann Worldgroup, “53 percent of those aged 16-22 and 48 percent of those aged 23-30 would give up their own sense of smell if it meant they could keep an item of technology.”) For me, too, it was a sense I thought I could do without—until I lost it.”
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: The Atlantic
3. Divisive words
AoKs/WoKs: Language, ethics
KQs: What does language reveal about our personal biases?
Description: “The split goes so deep that the two sides can't even agree on what the people entering Europe should be called. To those who view them sympathetically, they're refugees; to those who want them kept out, they're migrants. So which side is right? The answer's complicated."
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: Vox
4. Contemporary theories
AoKs/WoKs: Language, emotion, human sciences (psychology)
KQs: Does language interfere with our ability to communicate our emotions?
Description: “One way of understanding the enthusiasm for telepathy is to consider its inverse: the growing suspicion of traditional verbal communication. Consider the remarkable rise of emoji, which, according to one British linguistics expert, is “the fastest growing form of language in history, based on its incredible adoption rate and speed of evolution.”
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: The Atlantic
5. Impeded by words
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, technology
KQs: Can a link between violence and video games be proven?
Description: “Psychologists have confirmed that playing violent video games is linked to aggressive and callous behaviour. A review of almost a decade of studies found that exposure to violent video games was a "risk factor" for increased aggression."
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: The Independent
6. Moved by music
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, indigenous knowledge systems, human sciences (anthropology and sociology), memory
KQs: Does music help us to interpret and understand emotional knowledge?
Description: “If you think you’re obsessed with music, consider the BaBinga people from Central Africa, who have elaborate dances for almost every activity, from gathering honey to hunting for elephants. The anthropologist Gilbert Rouget, who lived with them in 1946, found that sleeping through the ceremonies was considered one of the greatest crimes.”
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: BBC
7. Messy science
AoKs/WoKs: Natural and human sciences, mathematics
KQs: Can scientific data be used to prove anything?
Description: “If we’re going to rely on science as a means for reaching the truth — and it’s still the best tool we have — it’s important that we understand and respect just how difficult it is to get a rigorous result. I could pontificate about all the reasons why science is arduous, but instead I’m going to let you experience one of them for yourself.”
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: FiveThirtyEight
8. Images that change the world
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences (journalism and psychology), the arts, ethics
KQs: Why does the knowledge provided by an image impact more on us than text?
Description: “By now, you've probably seen the photo. A lifeless boy, body limp and legs dangling, is carried by a Turkish paramilitary officer from the water's edge. The image is a powerful representation of the refugee crisis in and around the Mediterranean. Taken by photographer-reporter Nilufer Demir, the photograph sped quickly around the world in mass media and on social networks, sparking increased outrage with every post and retweet. Photographs like this stay with you, as unshakable as a bad childhood memory.”
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: Vice News
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
7 more detailed real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
5 ‘quick’ real life situations, helping you to consider:
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The inspirational TED Companion Pack presents TOK-related questions on 60 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, be involved in the most important contemporary knowledge issues, and gather material for their essays and presentations.
16 Essential speakers are identified, and advice is provided for including the key ideas of the talks into essay and presentations.
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We are the world's most used online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the May edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
We've been working to improve the theoryofknowledge.net app, so if you haven't already downloaded it, click on the buttons below to take you to either the Apple Store, or Google Play, depending on your device. We are now sending out RLSs and KQs as push notifications, so make sure this is activated on the app.
We'll also be announcing an exciting joint venture with Cambridge University Press very soon, so although many students around the world are coming to the end of their TOK journey, we'll be continuing to help educators prepare for the start of the 2016 academic year.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we present the unpacked version of our first RLS.Premium subscribers to the newsletter receive all the stories presented in this way, plus ten extra stories, a focus on an area of knowledge or way of knowing, tips on the essay and presentation, and an embedded video about a key thinker. The premium newsletter also distinguishes between first and second order knowledge questions.
Also available is the TOK teaching pack. This includes a subscription to the premium newsletter, as well as copies of the essay and presentation guides, and a discount voucher that you can use to purchase further theoryofknowledge.net resources. Find out more about this innovative resourcehere.
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1. Journalistic perspectives
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, human sciences
First order KQs: Why have relations between the US police and ordinary citizens declined over the last year?
Second order KQs: Do nationalist and cultural biases affect the way the news is reported? What are the ethical implications of non-objective journalism?
Description: “If what is happening in Baltimore happened in a foreign country, here is how Western media would cover it:International leaders expressed concern over the rising tide of racism and state violence in America, especially concerning the treatment of ethnic minorities in the country and the corruption in state security forces around the country when handling cases of police brutality. The latest crisis is taking place in Baltimore, Maryland, a once-bustling city on the country’s Eastern Seaboard, where an unarmed man named Freddie Gray died from a severed spine while in police custody….”
Considering different perspectives: This article is built around a consideration of different perspectives. It is written as though it is about an issue affecting a foreign country, rather than the USA, and the result is that it is far more critical than it might have been otherwise. This leads us to consider the role of nationality when it comes to understanding political and social issues in the world, and the way our personal and social biases affect this understanding.
What are the implications of this RLS? Most of us are willing to accept that our knowledge about the world is inevitably biased, based on our upbringing, outlook on life, nationality, and so on. But quite how far that is the case is often difficult to accept. Do we judge other cultures and people differently to the way we judge our own? This article demonstrates that that difference is a lot more pronounced than we might have thought or believed. It also raises many questions about how the news is reported, and how foreign issues are treated differently to domestic ones.
Source: Washington Post
2. Political symbols
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, sense perception, emotion, history
KQs: To what extent do we recognise the connotations of a symbol instinctively?
Description: “Hillary Clinton’s new logo, [is] a blue and red “H” with a bold arrow as the crossbar. Since anything to do with Hillary raises red (and blue) flags, critics assumed that the logo must be packed with symbolism. So, left-wingers were displeased that the arrow is red and points to the right, while right-wingers were annoyed that, when reversed, the arrow points left. Not since the Soviets ideologically censored art for geographical orientation—things facing West were forbidden—has the mere direction of anything been so disparaged.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Atlantic
3. World languages
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences, indigenous knowledge systems
KQs: Is language and identity analogous?
Description: “These seven maps and charts, visualized by The Washington Post, will help you understand how diverse other parts of the world are in terms of languages. Not all continents are equally diverse in the number of spoken languages. Whereas Asia leads the statistics with 2,301 languages, Africa follows closely with 2,138. There are about 1,300 languages in the Pacific, and 1,064 in South and North America. Europe, despite its many nation-states, is at the bottom of the pack with just 286.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: Washington Post
4. Music revolutions
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, natural sciences, reason
KQs: Can we use scientific methods to understand the arts?
Description: “The evolution of western pop music, spanning from 1960 to 2010, has been analysed by scientists. A team from Queen Mary University of London and Imperial College London looked at more than 17,000 songs from the US Billboard Hot 100. They found three music revolutions - in 1964, 1983 and 1991 - and traced the loss of blues chords from the charts, as well as the birth of disco. The study is published in the Royal Society Open Science journal. The team also refuted claims that pop music is starting to sound the same.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: BBC
5. Rules of art
AoKs/WoKs: Mathematics, the arts
KQs: Is beauty an objective concept?
Description: “Revered as the formula that defines beauty, the golden ratio is a mathematically derived principle claimed by many to be embodied in objects as diverse as a spiralled seashell and the Parthenon. But the widespread belief that the golden ratio is the natural blueprint for beauty is pseudo-scientific “hocus-pocus” and a “myth that refuses to go away”, according to leading mathematicians.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
6. Heart versus head
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, reason, human sciences
KQs: Is it unethical for politicians to appeal to our emotions rather than reason?
Description: “The sensible way, surely, to come to a decision is read the party manifestos and assess the policies? Failing that, there's a plentiful supply of election news as well as websites promising to match your values with what the parties are offering. But, as psychologists like to remind us, we're not rational beings. Setting aside individuals who earn a living listening to politicians (mainly journalists and economists at the Institute for Fiscal Studies), most people probably don't read manifestos or carefully digest the Today programme's interviews with politicians. Of course, many people keep across the news - but how many of us could recite each party's position on eliminating the deficit?”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: BBC
7. Learning morality
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, human sciences
KQs: Is ethical awareness innate?
Description: “[Dr Laura] Warren’s belief is that children, like all of us, are psychologically tribal, and that those primeval instincts remain overwhelmingly powerful. “We have too much of a rosy, skewed, unhelpful picture of kids in this country,” she says. As in, we see them all as angelic and beautiful? “Absolutely. But they’re real. They’re mini adults.” And that means they’re machiavellian. “We all want to get the most out of a situation for ourselves,” she says. “That’s a human trait. That’s basic Darwinian survival.” Warren is trying to exploit children’s desire to earn treats and tribal status by connecting such rewards to their behaviour. “There’s competing in the tribe and cooperating in it. I try to balance those instincts.””
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
8. Emotions of flies
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, natural sciences
KQs: To what extent is emotion a universal concept?
Description: “Insects and other animals might be able to feel fear similar to the way humans do, say scientists, after a study that could one day teach us about our own emotions. To find out whether flies are able to feel emotion, researchers broke down feelings into their smallest blocks, and then tried to find ways of studying whether the flies were exhibiting those behaviours.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Independent
9. The right to incite hatred
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics
KQs: To what extent is xenophobia or religious animosity based on an ignorance of other cultures?
Description: “The co-founder of the group behind the contest to award $10,000 for the best cartoon depiction of Muhammad is a New Yorker who runs a blog that campaigns to stop the “Islamification” of America. Pamela Geller used her blog Atlas Shrugs to declare “this is war” in the hours after the shooting of two gunmen at the contest. The event had been organised by the American Freedom Defense Initiative, a group she set up with Robert Spencer in 2010. Geller, the winner of numerous awards from far-right organisations such as the David Horowitz Freedom Center, is credited with coining the term “ground zero mega mosque” as part of highly publicised campaign against the development of a community centre, which included a mosque, a few blocks from where the twin towers once stood in New York.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
10. Shampoo and pseudoscience
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, language, natural sciences, ethics
KQs: Where is the line between spurious and genuine scientific claims?
Description: “Given the existence of the BIEB [‘beauty-industry efficacy bias’], we should always bring a furiously critical eye to the assessment of any claim made by Big Beauty. Phrases such as “clinically proven” or “dermatologist approved” have little meaning because they could refer to almost anything. For example, what kind of study led to the representation that a given product was clinically proven? Did the manufacturers simply ask a couple of buyers? Do not be fooled by this kind of language, particularly when the presence of the BIEB makes critical analysis of the claims unlikely.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Atlantic
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
5 more unpacked real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
...and 5 'quick' RLSs, looking at:
We also focus on the arts, identifying central terms and ideas that you need to grasp, including a video talk by a key thinker, and quotes for you to consider.
Finally, we think about structuring the importance of writing a TOK journal.
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Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly.
The TOK Sessions Pack
The awesome TOK Sessions pack is now being used by hundreds of educators around the world to deliver the TOK course, and help students understand the assessment tasks.
The pack contains 85 lesson plans for all the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing, introductory lessons on TOK, plenary sessions for the end of the course, and suggestions on how to explain the essay and presentation.
Purchase the TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion Pack
The inspirational TED Companion Pack presents TOK-related questions on 60 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, be involved in the most important contemporary knowledge issues, and gather material for their essays and presentations.
16 Essential speakers are identified, and advice is provided for including the key ideas of the talks into essay and presentations.
Purchase the TED Companion Pack
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2015 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
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Today is a relatively simple day. Below is a series of emails we’ve received in the last year or so from a TOK helper site that are actually relatively good at showing how contemporary events (aka news articles) actually have a range of TOK issues in them. Each monthly email has a set of about 8 articles/links that they have identified the AOKs/WOKs intersecting in the article’s RLS. They also for many distinguish between a first order KQ (that still has a foot in the real world (for example: Was Castro a good leader of Cuba?)) and then a second order KQ that is truly desired to be explored for the TOK Oral task: (for example: How is our view of the past shaped by our cultural or historical/time perspective?)
YOUR GENERAL TASK with class of 2018 through Thanksgiving is to tweet to @SCHSTOK or email me or simply bring up in your class a range of contemporary examples/articles from your subject area and try to guide students to see the TOK KQs that emerge from these RLSs.
If you want a specific task for today it could be to look through TOK articles linked on Twitter at https://twitter.com/SCHSTOK and email me the link and your attempts at writing KQs that emerge from that article/RLS.
explore April's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resources educate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the April edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter
We're very happy to announce that we have just passed 10,000 likes on our Facebook page. This page has grown organically since we first set it up in 2009, and is a great place to begin if you are looking for real life situations to help understand and illustrate TOK concepts.
You can see the way we are developing our new 'Big Question' approach to TOK by checking out the sample lessons on this page. In August, we will be releasing a huge new resource for TOK which delivers the course around this approach, and brings together all the different strands of our resources.
We will also be updating our critical thinking section of the site over the next few days, adding a few links to articles, and a lesson plan for a class of pre-IB Diploma thinkers. You can see this for yourself here.
To access the sample Google Slides presentation of this month's newsletter, click the image below. The presentation can be copied to your own Google Drive, and adapted for use in lessons. Note that a full presentation (ie slides for all 15 of the main RLSs) is provided with the premium TOK newsletter subscription
RLSs & KQs
As always, we feature the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. To receive all the RLSs like this (plus 7 extra ones, and 5 further 'quick' RLSs), upgrade your subscription by clicking on the button below.
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1. Historians and gamers
AoKs/WoKs: History, imagination, the arts
Big Question: Representing reality
First order KQs: How accurate will ‘Call of Duty: World War II’ be?
Second order KQs: Does a 'dialogue between academic history and video games' help us to engage with the past? What role does imagination play in helping us gain knowledge about the past?
Description: “Historians interested in seeing where a huge portion of society is engaging with themes, ideas and material from the past should – and often do – look to games. How history is represented in these titles, how the player interacts with the world and why historical settings are utilised in such a way are all big topics worthy of academic attention.”
Discussion points and exploration: As games such as Call of Duty get more sophisticated, their recreations of the past become ever more extensive and complete. Combine this with the fact that they are played by many people around the world, and you have a very powerful source of knowledge about history. But how useful is this knowledge? Can it provide us with an insight that more traditional sources can’t provide us with? And how important is it for historians to be aware that this informs the way many people interact with the past?
Source: The Guardian
2. Milk substitutes
AoKs/WoKs: Language
KQs: Does the connotation or the denotation of a word convey its meaning?
Description: “There is no such thing as soy milk. The same goes for almond, coconut, hemp, rice, cashew, hazelnut, and oat. Milk comes from mammals and there are no lactating almonds. While plant-based beverages have sought to broaden milk's definition since the Chinese company Vitasoy entered the US market in 1979, the Food and Drug Administration still has a very specific, cow-centric, definition.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: Big Think
3. Revolutionary misconception
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences
KQs: How many paradigms are based on fundamental misconceptions?
Description: “A study of people born with one hand suggests neuroscientists may have fundamentally misunderstood the way the brain is organised, a scientist has claimed. Dr Tamar Makin, of University College London, said the new theory – if proved correct – would have “massive implications”, adding it was “mind-blowing” to think that scientists could have been mistaken for so long.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: The Independent
4. Intuitive reason
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, intuition
KQs: Is reason a type of intuition?
Description: “We suggest that reason is very much like any other cognitive mechanism—it is itself a form of intuition. Like other intuitions, it is a specialised mechanism. The specificity of reason is to bear... on reasons. Reason delivers intuitions about relationships between reasons and conclusions: some reasons are intuitively better than others. When you want to convince someone, you use reason to construct arguments. When someone wants to convince you of something, you use reason to evaluate their arguments.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: New Humanist
5. Tuning out truth
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, reason, intuition
KQs: To what extent are we persuaded by facts?
Description: “...facts alone are feeble things. Given more information, most people don’t change their minds, even when the new data seems to support the opposite argument. They convince themselves that the information is misleading (“alternative”) or simply wrong (“fake”). They tune out stuff that’s uncomfortable to hear and tune in to cable news programs like reliably tell them that their intuition about the world is even more right than they knew.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: The Atlantic
6. Multiculturalism vs colonialism
AoKs/WoKs: History, human sciences, language
KQs: How do politicians use the past to consolidate power in the present?
Description: “Will the xenophobic populism that brought Brexit to the U.K. and Donald Trump to the White House claim the Elysée Palace, too? Le Pen’s expected advance has been one of the few constants in a campaign marked by surprising, dispiriting twists. To a historian of French colonialism like me, one of the most revealing is the renewed debate over the memory and teaching of the colonial past. The candidates’ positions on this issue can be seen as a revealing barometer of French attitudes toward immigration, race and multiculturalism today.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: The Conversation
7. Personality types
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
KQs: Can personality types be categorized?
Description: “At the topmost level, there are two types of people in the world: Those who think personality types can be categorized and those who can't. Among those in the first group are psychologists who began developing a system for classifying personality traits based on an analysis of language way back in the1880s.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: Big Think
8. Cultural norms
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, emotion
KQs: Can conclusions be drawn about an entire nation’s personality type?
Description: “Whether it’s the caricature of the introverted English, the brash Americans or the industrious Japanese, national stereotypes are easy to come by. But do countries really have their own distinct personalities? When psychologists have given the same personality test to hundreds or thousands of people from different nations, they have indeed found that the average scores tend to come out differently across cultures. In other words, the average personality in one country often really is different from the average personality in another.”
Discussion points, exploration, further KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription!
Source: BBC
What extra KQs and RLSs did we explore in the premium newsletter this month?
In depth RLSs -
- Do we need ‘distance’ in order to properly understand something?
- Are knowledge questions meant to be answered?
- Why does our scientific knowledge about the world change?
- What constitutes solid scientific evidence?
- Does misinformation exist only when there is a financial motive for creating it?
- Does nationalism help or hinder us from gaining ethical knowledge?
- Why are experts sometimes not the best people to discover new knowledge?
Quick RLSs:
- Do we need a word for something in order to understand it?
- How compromised is science by fake research?
- Do new discoveries provide us with new knowledge, or just force us to question what we already know?
- Are selfies ‘art’?
- Why is evidence-based reasoning sometimes unsuccessful in transmitting ideas?
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Upgrade to the premium TOK newsletter subscription
The TOK newsletter presentation
Follow the image below to take you to our sample Google Slides Presentation for this month's newsletter. The premium newsletter features all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To download the presentation, select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The TOK Sessions Pack
Our TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
- An introduction to TOK (how TOK is assessed)
- The nature of knowledge (rationalism and empricism)
- A way of knowing (sense perception)
- An area of knowledge (the arts)
- Assessment advice (the TOK essay)
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Historical Investigation Pack
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is also ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Purchase the HIP
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2017 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
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explore March's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the March edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter
We are continuing to link the stories in the newsletter to the 8 Big Questions, our shortly-to-be released new approach to delivering the TOK course.
You can download some sample TOK lessons based on this approach on this page; we'll be providing updates on the progress of this revolutionary new resource over the next few months. If you update to the premium newsletter, you'll also have access to the Big Questions themselves on the TOK newsletter archive page; use the button below to do this.
Finally, we’d like to remind you that the latest version of the TOK Presentation Guide is now available for download. This is an updated version of the original guide, with brand new final chapter featuring the 7-step summary, and exemplar presentation. Follow this link for more details.
To access the Google Slides sample presentation of this month's newsletter, click the image below. The premium newsletter comes with a full presentation, with each RLS covered in this way.
As always, we feature the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. To receive all the RLSs like this (plus 7 extra ones, and 5 further 'quick' RLSs), upgrade your subscription by clicking on the button below.
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RLSs & KQs
1. Himba perception
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception, indigenous knowledge systems, human sciences
Big Question: Perspectives
First order KQs: How does Himba culture differ from Western culture?
Second order KQs: Does culture shape how our senses acquire knowledge? Are the limits of sense perception determined by nature or nurture?
Description: “The Himba people of Namibia can see fine details and ignore distraction much better than most other human beings – a finding that may reflect the many ways that modern life is changing our minds and abilities.”
Discussion points and exploration: This real life situation illustrates very nicely the difference between different cultures (industrialised, large-scale societies, and indigenous societies) when it comes to the limits of sense perception. Is the article right in suggesting that the differences may be due to lifestyles, and our dependency on technology to provide us with an accurate picture of the world? Or is the evidence still insufficient to say that?
Source: BBC
2. True lies
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, faith, emotion
KQs: What determines whether facts are believable?
Description: “I remember looking at her and thinking, ‘She’s totally lying.’ At the same time, I remember something in my mind saying, ‘And that doesn’t matter.’” For Daniel Shaw, believing the words of the guru he had spent years devoted to wasn’t blind faith exactly. It was something he chose. “I remember actually consciously making that choice.” There are facts, and there are beliefs, and there are things you want so badly to believe that they become as facts to you.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Atlantic
3. Living language
AoKs/WoKs: Language
KQs: In what way is language like a ‘child’?
Description: “Kory Stamper defines words for a living. In her new book, Word by Word, she documents the life of a lexicographer, from maintaining focus in the office to tackling the near-impossible task of defining English. As she explains in the above video, language is always changing.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: Vox
4. Cultural feelings
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion
KQs: How can we know whether our emotions a product of our culture?
Description: “When scientists set aside the classical view and just look at the data, a radically different explanation for emotion comes to light. We find that emotions are not universal but vary from culture to culture. They are not triggered; you create them.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
5. Rejecting GM food
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences
KQs: Should scientific policy be decided democratically?
Description: ‘A majority of EU countries voted on Monday against allowing two new genetically modified crops to be grown in Europe, batting the contentious decision on cultivation of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO) in Europe back to the EU executive… However, the votes against were not decisive in blocking their introduction because the opposition did not represent a "qualified majority" - also including countries that make up at least 65 percent of the EU population.’
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: DW
6. Quantifying the unquantifiable
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, human sciences
KQs: Is happiness objectively quantifiable?
Description: “Norway is the happiest place on Earth, according to a United Nations agency report - toppling neighbour Denmark from the number one position. The World Happiness Report measures "subjective well-being" - how happy the people are, and why. Denmark, Iceland, Switzerland and and Finland round out the top five, while the Central African Republic came last.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: BBC
7. Mapping language
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: What does a map of Europe look like, based on linguistics?
Description: “This linguistic map paints an alternative map of Europe, displaying the language families that populate the continent, and the lexical distance between the languages. The closer that distance, the more words they have in common. The further the distance, the harder the mutual comprehension.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: Big Think
8. Indigenous cures
AoKs/WoKs: Indigenous knowledge systems, reason, human sciences
KQs: How do Indigenous approaches to health differ from Western ones?
Description: “I am not what might be called a credulous person. But I would agree that the world is not as solid as we like to believe – complicated, multi-layered and mostly beyond my comprehension”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question: Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian (See also this more general article on Ayahuasca)
What extra KQs and RLSs did we explore in the premium newsletter this month?
In depth RLSs -
- Is a scientific explanation of the universe poetic?
- To what extent is our understanding of the world affected by the way it is presented?
- Do we need to draw on the divine to make understanding profound?
- Is (/should) science only the preserve of experts?
- How can rationality overcome determinism?
- Does not being able to explain something mean that we don’t understand it?
- What are the ethical and cultural boundaries of science - and why?
Quick RLSs:
- Do we wear our names, or do they wear us?
- Does it matter how precisely we use language?
- "ignorance... forces our minds to fill in gaps by invoking divinity." Discuss!
- How do people’s identities differ in the East and West?
- How can our understanding of the universe be based on mistranslations?
To upgrade your subscription, click on the button below.
Upgrade to the premium subscription
The TOK newsletter presentation
Follow the image below to take you to our sample Google Slides Presentation for February's newsletter. The premium newsletter features all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To download the sample presentation, select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder, and then make any changes to suit whatever you are currently covering in TOK.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
- An introduction to TOK (how TOK is assessed)
- The nature of knowledge (rationalism and empricism)
- A way of knowing (sense perception)
- An area of knowledge (the arts)
- Assessment advice (the TOK essay)
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Historical Investigation Pack
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is also ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Purchase the HIP
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2017 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
theoryofknowledge.net
12 Magrath Avenue
Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
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explore February's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the February edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free TOK newsletter
We have made one significant change to the premium newsletter this month, which we are very excited about: linking each RLS to one of our new ‘8 Big Questions’. This is a unique approach to TOK, that bases the delivery of the course on questions, rather than the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing. Amongst many other benefits, it allows the course to be driven more naturally by RLSs, gives a more complete and interlinked coverage of the nature of knowledge, and prepares students much more effectively for the essay and presentation.
We’ll be creating an array of resources to support this new approach during the coming months. You can see the first of these Big Questions indicated on the first RLS; by upgrading to the premium newsletter, you'll have access to all of them, with explanations of what each one comprises.
Earlier this month, we were honoured to be asked to provide a short video for the opening of the fantastic United World College TOK Conference, at Maastricht. This is organised purely by students, and has become arguably the foremost event of its kind in the world. You can view the video here.
Finally, we’d like to remind you that the latest version of the TOK Presentation Guide is now available for download. This is an updated version of the original guide, with brand new final chapter featuring the 7-step summary, and exemplar presentation. Follow this link for more details.
To access the Google Slides sample presentation of this month's newsletter, click the image below. The premium newsletter comes with a full presentation, with each RLS covered in this way.
As always, we feature the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. To receive all the RLSs like this (plus 7 extra ones, and 5 further 'quick' RLSs), upgrade your subscription by clicking on the button below.
Upgrade your subscription
News stories & knowledge questions
1. The language of morality
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, language
First order KQs: What are Nigel Farage’s moral principles?
Second order KQs: To what extent does our moral comfort zone exist within the language we speak? What is the relationship between language and ethics?
Description: “Mr Farage addressed an enthusiastic audience at the annualConservative Political Action Conference, as right-wing Americans fully embraced the nationalism that characterises Trumpism and Brexit. "Our real friends in the world speak English, have common law, and stand by us in times of crisis," Mr Farage told the room of Trump supporters.”
Discussion points and exploration: This story illustrates the strong link that exists between language and identity, and the extent to which that identity then forms the basis of our moral outlook, and how we gather ethical knowledge. For many, the language we speak is synonymous with who we are, and who we identify with. But what are the implications of this in a globalised world? Should we seek to expand our circle of empathy beyond those with whom we can comfortably communicate? Or is Farage right - our friends are the ones who share our linguistic sensibilities?
Big Question: 3 - Connections
Source: The Independent
2. Virtual history
AoKs/WoKs: History
KQs: Can virtual reality improve our understanding of history?
Description: “VR makes us complicit in the unfolding of the story and by doing so it makes the past appear as present time - a sequence of events that is constantly unfolding around us. Quite the opposite of thinking about History as something that is static and buried in the past.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: BBC
3. Revolutionary art
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, ethics
KQs: Does purpose undermine art?
Description: “We will never stop looking at the art of the Russian avant garde, nor should we. Yet we need to place it in its true context. It is a lazy, immoral lie to keep pretending there was anything glorious about the brutal experiment Lenin imposed on Russia – or anything innocent about its all-too-brilliant propaganda art. Perhaps the Royal Academy is about to open that very show, but its shallow title seems all too happy to cash in on revolutionary chic. No doubt the Morning Star’s art critic will be there in a flash. Me, I will be remembering the kulaks.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
4. Scientific fame
AoKs/WoKs: The natural sciences
KQs: What determines scientific fame?
Description: “Throughout his life, Humboldt sought out the world’s interconnections. Today knowledge can seem hopelessly fragmented. The sciences and humanities speak different languages, the scientific disciplines frequently seem incommensurable and the university itself often feels more like a multiversity. Against this backdrop, Humboldt represents the aspiration for encompassing order; if only we look deeply enough, we can locate an intricate underlying harmony.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Conversation
5. Distance psychology
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
KQs: To what extent is science based on speculation?
Description: “The American Psychiatric Association has a longstanding taboo on evaluating public figures from afar. It’s called the Goldwater Rule, named after an infamous magazine article in which politician Barry Goldwater’s psychological stability was assessed by thousands of psychiatrists. The rule forbids psychiatrists, who are medical doctors, from making judgments about a public figure’s mental health without personally evaluating them. But the temptation to break it is always strong in presidential election years.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: Vox
6. Articulating faith
AoKs/WoKs: Faith, religious knowledge systems, language
KQs: What is the relationship between faith and religious knowledge systems?
Description: “As a writer and scholar of religions, I [Reza Aslan] am often asked how, knowing all that I know about the religions of the world, I can still call myself a believer, let alone a Muslim. It's a reasonable question. Considering the role that religion so often plays in fueling conflicts abroad and inspiring bigotry at home, it is not always so easy to defend the value of religion in society. And, in a world in which reason and religion seem to be moving further apart, it is certainly understandable why so many people view religious faith as the hallmark of an irrational mind.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: CNN
7. Formal expression
AoKs/WoKs: Language
KQs: Why does language use change over time?
Description: “When it comes to texting, the period, full stop, point – whatever you call it – has been getting a lot of attention. People have begun noticing slight changes to the way our smallest punctuation mark is deployed, from declarations that it’s going out of style to claims that it’s becoming angry. What they’re actually noticing is written language becoming more flexible, with texting possessing its own set of stylistic norms (sometimes informally called “textspeak” or “textese”).”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: The Conversation
8. Rosling's numbers
AoKs/WoKs: Mathematics, human sciences
KQs: What potential does statistics have to provide us with knowledge about the world?
Description: “Rosling was also one of the founders of Gapminder, an incredible “fact-tank” — as opposed to “think tank” — whose mission is supplanting the wealth of disinformation floating around out there with actual, data-backed facts. It’s eye-opening and a ton of fun if you like knowing things. Much like Rosling himself.”
Discussion points, further exploration, more KQs, and the Big Question:Upgrade to the premium newsletter.
Source: Big Think
What extra KQs and RLSs did we explore in the premium newsletter this month?
KQs that we consider in depth this month:
- Can we effectively transfer skills from one area of knowledge to another?
- How do cultural factors determine our outlook on technology?
- Can we use ‘evolutionary’ factors to explain how we use language?
- How (and why) has our concepts of ‘factual’ developed over time?
- Can we have ‘religious feelings’ without music?
- Where is the line between real and pseudo science?
- How much can we tell about a person from a photo?
And our five ‘quick’ KQs:
- To what extent is medicine based on objective evidence?
- Are tattoos the ‘ultimate art form’?
- What should we fear more - a lack or surfeit of information?
- Is Minecraft art?
- Do we make God in our own image?
Upgrade your subscription
The TOK newsletter presentation
Follow the image below to take you to our sample Google Slides Presentation for February's newsletter. The premium newsletter features all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To download the sample presentation, select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder, and then make any changes to suit whatever you are currently covering in TOK.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
- An introduction to TOK (how TOK is assessed)
- The nature of knowledge (rationalism and empricism)
- A way of knowing (sense perception)
- An area of knowledge (the arts)
- Assessment advice (the TOK essay)
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Historical Investigation Pack
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is also ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Purchase the HIP
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2017 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
theoryofknowledge.net
12 Magrath Avenue
Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
Add us to your address book
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explore January's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the January edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free TOK newsletter
Our real life situations come from several different sources, and cover many of the different AoKs and WoKs. This month the stories have a particular emphasis on how we use language, and the way this affects the knowledge it imparts.
We’d also like to remind you that the latest version of the TOK Presentation Guide is now available for download. This is an updated version of the original guide, with brand new final chapter featuring the 7-step summary, and exemplar presentation. Follow this link for more details.
Click on the image below to take you to the sample Google Slides presentation for this month's newsletter. This can be copied to your own Google Drive, and you can then adapt for use in lessons. Note that the premium version of the newsletter presents all 15 of its RLSs in this way.
News stories & knowledge questions
1. Untranslatable emotions
AoKs/WoKs: Language, emotion
First order KQs: What makes a word or term difficult to translate?
Second order KQs: Can we increase the range of our emotional experiences by increasing our vocabularies?
Description: “[Tim] Lomas’s Positive Lexicography Project aims to capture the many flavours of good feelings (some of which are distinctly bittersweet) found across the world, in the hope that we might start to incorporate them all into our daily lives. We have already borrowed many emotion words from other languages, after all – think “frisson”, from French, or “schadenfreude”, from German – but there are many more that have not yet wormed their way into our vocabulary. Lomas has found hundreds of these "untranslatable" experiences so far – and he’s only just begun.
Discussion points and exploration: This provides us with a lovely store of words that take us beyond the schadenfreude and saudade examples, and allow us to really explore our emotional range, and how that depends (or not) on the vocabulary available to us. Do we need to have a word for something to be able to emotionally experience it?
Source: BBC
2. Newspeak
AoKs/WoKs: Language, the arts
KQs: What is the relationship between truth and language?
Description: “The post-truth era certainly shares aspects of the dystopian world of Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. Michael Gove’s infamous comment that Britain has had enough of experts is just one step away from 2+2 = 5. In the interrogation scene in 1984 this is the most appalling moment: before now we read it as a ludicrous indictment of the rejection of reality (surely, we conclude, the party itself must know that 2+2 = 4; science, machines all depend on it). In Nineteen Eighty-Four, the elite, personified by O’Brien, foster and control this willingness to believe one thing one day, and one thing another."
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: Guardian
3. Hero revision
AoKs/WoKs: History, ethics
Qs: Why do our views about heroes change over time?
Description: “Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated on this day 69 years ago but his ideas of Hindu-Muslim unity still haunt India's Hindu hardliners, writes BBC Hindi's Rajesh Joshi. The discomfort of the Hindu hardline right with Mahatma Gandhi became apparent once again when a senior leader of the governing Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) recently described Prime Minister Narendra Modi as a "bigger brand name" than the iconic leader of India's freedom struggle.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: BBC
4. Scientific communication
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, language
KQs: Is it possible to find a balance between clarity and over-simplification when it comes to communicating scientific knowledge?
Description: “Scientists and the media need to communicate more science and communicate it better. Good communication ensures that scientific progress benefits society, bolsters democracy, weakens the potency of fake news andmisinformation and fulfills researchers’ responsibility to engage with the public. Such beliefs have motivated training programs, workshops and a research agendafrom the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine on learning more about science communication. A resounding question remains for science communicators: What can we do better?”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: The Conversation
5. Alternative facts
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: Do euphemisms always impede our understanding of the world?
Description: “President Trump's special adviser Kellyanne Conway proposed something new on Sunday: "alternative facts." The strange phrase entered the lexicon when Conway told NBC's Chuck Todd that the numerous misstatements in press secretary Sean Spicer's angry statement to reporters Saturday were actually "alternative facts." The phrase called into the question Conway's understanding of the word "facts" and caused widespread mockery on Sunday.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: CNN
6. Value of movies
AoKs/WoKs: The arts
KQs: Do fictional representations of the world help us to understand it?
Description: “Movies matter more now than ever… it’s the way we look at ourselves and learn and communicate.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: Hollywood Reporter
7. Ownership of art
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, human sciences
KQs: Who ‘owns’ art?
Description: “It could become one of the most important legal battles in music - Sir Paul McCartney is suing Sony over control of The Beatles' back catalogue. The star has gone to a US court, seeking to regain the publishing rights to 267 of the band's classic songs. He's been trying to get them back since the 1980s, when Michael Jackson famously out-bid him for the rights. Jackson's debt-ridden estatesold the songs to Sony last year, along with others including New York, New York.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: BBC
8. Non-objective journalism
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
KQs: What are the implications on our understanding of the world of the rise of non-objective journalism?
Description: “As a political scientist focused on game theory, I approach the media from the perspective of strategic choice. Media outlets make decisions about how to position themselves within a market and how to signal to news consumers what kinds outlets they are in ideological terms. But they also interact strategically with politicians, who use journalists’ ideological leanings and accusations of leanings to undermine the credibility of even the most valid criticisms.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more KQs : See the premium version of the newsletter.
Source: The Conversation
The new TOK newsletter presentation
Follow the image below to take you to a sample of our Google Slides Presentation for January's newsletter. The premium newsletter includes all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter presented in this way, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To download the presentation, select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder, and then make any changes to suit whatever you are currently covering in TOK.
We hope you and your students enjoy this new addition to the TOK newsletter!
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
7 more big real life situations, prompting us to ask -
- Where does scientific understanding come from?
- How valid are models in helping us to understand the world?
- Should we draw on empathy to make moral decisions?
- How can religious knowledge provide a foundation of rational thinking?
- Is it valid to divide our thinking processes into analysis and intuition?
- How can language help to restructure your understanding of time?
- What are the implications of ‘religious illiteracy’?
And 5 'quick' RLSs, leading us to -
- Does TV help or hinder us from understanding the past?
- Is something only real if it features on social media?
- To what extent does psychology inspire the composition of technology sounds?
- How can the act of looking be a ‘political act’ (according to John Berger)?
- What constitutes valid historical evidence?
To receive all this, as well as access to an archive of premium newsletters reaching back to November 2014, click on the button below.
Upgrade to the premium newsletter subscription
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
- An introduction to TOK (how TOK is assessed)
- The nature of knowledge (rationalism and empricism)
- A way of knowing (sense perception)
- An area of knowledge (the arts)
- Assessment advice (the TOK essay)
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Historical Investigation Pack
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is also ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Purchase the HIP
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2017 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
theoryofknowledge.net
12 Magrath Avenue
Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
Add us to your address book
unsubscribe from this list update subscription preferences
explore December's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the December edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletterWe hope you had a good Christmas, and have started the new year positively.
Our latest version of the TOK Presentation Guide is now available for download. This is an updated version of the original guide, with brand new final chapter featuring a model presentation on PowerPoint/Google Slides, plus a step-by-step summary of how to create a TOK presentation (This final chapter can be purchased separately). Follow this link for more details.
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is also ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Download a free sample of the HIP
Click on the image below to take you to the Google Slides version of this month's first RLS. If you upgrade to the premium newsletter, you will receive all 15 of the main RLSs presented in this way.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we present the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. If you would like to receive all the RLSs in this format, plus 7 additional 'big' RLSs and 5 'quick' RLSs, as well as the Google Slides presentation for the newsletter, upgrade to the premium newsletter by hitting the button below.
Upgrade to the premium TOK newsletter
1. Critical cartography
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception, human sciences
First order KQs: How are world maps created?
Second order KQs: Are our visualisations of the world valid? How can self-aggrandisement shape the way information about the world is presented?
Description: “My struggle to make a flat map out of the plastic globe is indicative of a challenge mapmakers have faced for centuries: It is mathematically impossibleto translate the surface of a sphere onto a plane without some form of distortion. To solve this problem, mathematicians and cartographers have developed a huge library of representations of the globe, each distorting a certain attribute and preserving others. For instance, the Mercator projection preserves the shape of countries while distorting the size, especially near the north and south pole.”
Discussion points and exploration: This is a lovely video about the difficulties of creating an accurate 2D representation of the world, and the compromises that are made in order to do so. Why has the Mercator projection ended up as the ubiquitous version of the world map, particularly given its problems? What are the implications of this in terms of how we visualise the world?
Source: Vox
2. Fashionable insult
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: Do our insults define or reflect society?
Description: “The term has undergone a curious journey to become the most combustible insult of 2016. It emerged a few years ago on American campuses asa means of criticising the hypersensitivity of a younger generation, where it was tangled up in the debate over safe spaces and no platforming. A much-memed line from Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club expresses a very early version of the sentiment in 1996: “You are not special. You are not a beautiful and unique snowflake. You are the same organic and decaying matter as everyone else.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Guardian
3. Biased mathematics
AoKs/WoKs: Mathematics
First order KQs: Why has the role of algorithms in increased in importance?
Second order KQs: Are algorithms biased?
Description: “Life-threatening or not, the algorithms, artificial intelligence and machine learning operating away from public view (Forrester predicts AI investment will grow 300 per cent in 2017) are increasingly being questioned. Technologists, politicians and academics have all called for greater transparency around the systems used by dominant tech firms.”
Discussion points and exploration: Algorithms are playing an increasing role in our lives, and the way in which we are controlled, and we have considered the implications of this in terms of various areas of knowledge, such as ethics and human sciences. But this article is interesting for the way in which it questions the objectivity of algorithms, reminding us that although mathematics itself cannot be biased, those who do the programming can - so does this mean algorithms should never be trusted to make our decisions for us?
Source: Wired
4. Hypothetically relevant
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics
KQs: Is the runaway trolley dilemma more relevant than ever?
Description: “The trolley problem highlights a fundamental tension between two schools of moral thought. The utilitarian perspective dictates that most appropriate action is the one that achieves the greatest good for the greatest number. Meanwhile, the deontological perspective asserts that certain actions – like killing an innocent person – are just wrong, even if they have good consequences. In both versions of the trolley problem above, utilitarians say you should sacrifice one to save five, while deontologists say you should not.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Guardian
5. Indigenous voice
AoKs/WoKs: Indigenous knowledge questions, language
KQs: Should knowledge be protected? How has our attitude to indigenous knowledge and culture changed over time?
Description: “For the first time in Peru’s history, a national news broadcast has been aired entirely in Quechua, the indigenous language of the Inca empire, which is still spoken by some 4 million Peruvians. Called Ñuqanchik – which means ‘all of us’ in Quechua – the daily news programme that launched this week targets speakers of the language that some historians trace back to Peru’s earliest civilizations 5,000 years ago.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Guardian
6. Better than ever?
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, mathematics, history, reason, intuition
KQs: What constitutes definitive evidence in the human sciences and history?
Description: “A recent survey asked, “All things considered, do you think the world is getting better or worse, or neither getting better nor worse?” In Sweden, 10 percent thought things are getting better, in the US the figure was only 6 percent, and in Germany only 4 percent. Very few people think the world is getting better.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Vox
7. Morality and the law
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, human sciences
KQs: How closely aligned are morality and the law?
Description: “A French woman in her sixties who murdered her husband in 2012 has been released after a second intervention by President Francois Hollande…. Campaigners were overjoyed by the news. But Virginie Duval, the head of the French union of magistrates, complained that the president had acted "to please public opinion", pointing out that the judiciary had followed the law when it rejected Ms Sauvage's appeals.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: BBC
8. Gut feeling
AoKs/WoKs: Intuition, reason
KQs: Is intuition alone sufficient for making a valid ethical decision?
Description: “Helping someone in desperate need is an ethical choice, yet it is a choice we would all make without hesitating, i.e. thinking a single thought. The reason, according to Harvard Law Professor Glenn Cohen, is that ethical choices start in the gut. Our intuition, programmed my millions of years of evolution, instructs us what to do without needing rational deliberation.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Big Think
The new TOK newsletter presentation
Follow the image below to take you to a sample of our Google Slides Presentation for December's newsletter. The premium newsletter includes all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter presented in this way, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To download the presentation, select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder, and then make any changes to suit whatever you are currently covering in TOK.
We hope you and your students enjoy this new addition to the TOK newsletter!
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
- An introduction to TOK (how TOK is assessed)
- The nature of knowledge (rationalism and empricism)
- A way of knowing (sense perception)
- An area of knowledge (the arts)
- Assessment advice (the TOK essay)
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2017 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
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November's events and issues
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the November edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter
Our latest version of the TOK Presentation Guide will be released next week. This is an updated version of the original guide, with the biggest change being a Google Slides (or PowerPoint) 'model' presentation, with a step-by-step overview of how to create a similar presentation using your own RLS and KQ. The guide will be released on 15th December, and can be ordered here. Note that you can order the model presentation separately from the rest of the guide.
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP) - is now ready for download. Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Download a free sample of the HIP
The Premium Newsletter now comes with a Google Slides presentation. You can see how this works for the first of our RLSs by clicking on the image below. This can be copied to your own Google Drive, and you can then adapt for use in lessons.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we present the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. If you would like to receive all the RLSs in this format, plus 7 additional 'big' RLSs and 5 'quick' RLSs, as well as the Google Slides presentation for the newsletter, upgrade to the premium newsletter by hitting the button below.
Upgrade to the premium newsletter
1. Death of Fidel
AoKs/WoKs: History
First order KQs: Was Castro a good leader of Cuba?
Second order KQs: How is our view of the past shaped by our perspective?
Description: "The Cuban people are feeling sad because of the loss of our commander in chief Fidel Castro Ruz, and we wish him, wherever he is, that he is blessed, and us Cubans love him," a young Cuban woman told CNN… [on the other hand…] Revelers spilled into the streets of Miami. They popped champagne, clanged pots, cheered and waved the Cuban flag in jubilation. They stood outside the popular Versailles restaurant in Little Havana with signs reading, "Satan, Fidel is now yours."
Discussion points and exploration: One of the biggest questions in TOK is why history is constantly subject to reinterpretation. Perspective - determined by social, economic, ethnic, or gender - is a key part of the answer to this. There are few leaders as divisive as Castro, who was a hero to some, and a villain to others. Can we reach an objective decision about his achievements and legacy? Or is it impossible to escape our personal and shared paradigms?
Source: CNN
2. Perils of prediction
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, mathematics
KQs: Can human behaviour be understood via generalisations?
Description: “Polls have missed recent elections in the U.S. and abroad by margins at least as big. Every poll, and every prediction based on it, is probabilistic in nature: There’s always a chance the leader loses. And Clinton probably didn’t even lose the national popular vote; she just didn’t win it by as much as polls suggested. But Tuesday’s miss was an important one because Clinton appeared to lead by a margin small enough that it might just have been polling error. That turned out to be mostly true — true enough for her to lose in the Electoral College, and for Democrats to fall far short of taking control of the Senate.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Vox & FiveThirtyEight
3. Erasing identity
AoKs/WoKs: IKS, ethics
KQs: Why do governments fear different knowledge systems to their own cultures?
Description: “For nearly a century, the Canadian government took indigenous Canadians from their families and placed them in church-run boarding schools, forcibly assimilating them to Western culture. Children as young as 2 or 3 years old were taken from their homes, their language extinguished, their culture destroyed.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
4. Personal history
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, history
KQs: Can we understand big events via the experiences of one person?
Description: “The National Geographic cover photo of Gula was taken by Steve McCurry in 1984 in a refugee camp in Pakistan. It became one of the defining images of a conflict between mujahideen insurgents and Soviet occupying forces...Gula is just one of many Afghans to be caught up in the ongoing effort to persuade refugees to go home. Nadra says it has detected 60,675 cards that were fraudulently obtained by foreign nationals.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Guardian
5. Ghostly science
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, sense perception
KQs: Can we trust our senses?
Description: “...the frontoparietal cortex is the same brain region that lets us sense our own bodies, and be aware of our own kinesthetic motions. If it can be duped, how do we know that it’s always reliable? How sure are you that your hand is holding a mobile phone, that your thumb is scrolling on the screen, and that you’re tucking it away in your pocket? It feels real, your frontoparietal cortex tells you that’s very real, but this experiment suggests it could very well be an illusion. How confident are you that your sense of your own body is real? It’s something we haven’t got to the bottom of yet.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Big Think
6. Invention of progress
AoKs/WoKs: History, human sciences
KQs: Which central assumptions form the basis of how we understand history?
Description: “Such a belief may seem self-evident today, but most people in the more-remote past believed that history moved in some kind of cycle or followed a path that was determined by higher powers. The idea that humans should and could work consciously to make the world a better place for themselves and for generations to come is by and large one that emerged in the two centuries between Christopher Columbus and Isaac Newton. Of course, just believing that progress could be brought about is not enough—one must bring it about. The modern world began when people resolved to do so.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
7. Facebook News
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, technology
KQs: How should the news be reported to ensure accuracy?
Description: “... it has 1.6 billion users and is becoming an ever more important place for them to share news. More than 40% of the population of the United States say they get news on Facebook - and for many it is where they go to share and comment on stories. Stories like this - "Pope Francis Shocks World, Endorses Donald Trump for President", "Barack Obama Admits He Was Born in Kenya", or "Trump said in 1998 'If I were to run, I'd run as a Republican. They're the dumbest group of voters in the country'." What all of those stories had in common was that they were completely made up. That did not stop them being shared by millions of Facebook users.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: BBC
8. Faith, evidence, and repetition
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, reason
KQs: What is truth based on?
Description: “Neil DeGrasse Tyson, 58, is an American astrophysicist who is the director the of Hayden Planetarium in New York. A committed science communicator, he frequently appears on US television shows and has published 13 books, the latest of which is called Welcome to the Universe.”
Discussion points, exploration, and more second-order KQs: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Guardian
Also included in November's premium newsletter...
7 more big real life situations, prompting us to ask -
- Does the knowledge derived from indigenous myths serve a utilitarian purpose?
- What is the role of trust in producing knowledge?
- What is the limitation of data in providing us with meaningful knowledge?
- Which way of knowing do we use when we communicate with art?
- Are words the product of a changing society, or are they the agents of change?
- Is reason or emotion the leading way of knowing in decision-making?
- How central to the arts are explorations of ethical issues?
- How can different artforms provide insight about each other?
- How did Einstein’s ideas change our approach to science?
- Can a single word define a whole culture?
- Is ‘time-travel’ what sets us apart as humans?
- Can progress be measured?
Upgrade your subscription
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
- An introduction to TOK (how TOK is assessed)
- The nature of knowledge (rationalism and empricism)
- A way of knowing (sense perception)
- An area of knowledge (the arts)
- Assessment advice (the TOK essay)
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2016 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
theoryofknowledge.net
12 Magrath Avenue
Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
Add us to your address book
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October's big real life situations?
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the October edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter
The new Essay Guide for May 2017 is now available for download. This now comes as a pack, and includes two presentations designed to introduce the essay writing task, and tools to enable students to unpack the PTs on their own, and target the specific assessment tasks. For more information, and to purchase, followthis link.
Our first resource for non-TOK subjects is also proving very successful - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP). Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new History Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Download a free sample of the HIP
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we present the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. If you would like to receive all the RLSs in this format, plus 7 additional 'big' RLSs and 5 'quick' RLSs, as well as the Google Slides presentation for the newsletter, upgrade to the premium newsletter by hitting the button below.
Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
1. Dangerous history
AoKs/WoKs: History, human sciences
First order KQs: What role do governments play in deciding what history should be learned?
Second order KQs: In what way can an approach to history be ‘dangerous’? What should the purpose of history be? What can we tell about a culture from the way in which it produces historical knowledge? Who should decide what history we learn?
Description: “Neil MacGregor, the former director of the British Museum, has bemoaned Britain’s narrow view of its own history, calling it “dangerous and regrettable” for focusing almost exclusively on the “sunny side”. Speaking before the Berlin opening of his highly popular exhibition Germany – Memories of a Nation, MacGregor expressed his admiration for Germany’s rigorous appraisal of its history which he said could not be more different to that of Britain.”
Discussion points and exploration: We’ve thought about the purpose of history, and who is in charge of it before, but this is a very clear article that explains how and why using it to celebrate achievements, rather than acknowledge mistakes and moral bungling can provide us with a very misleading picture of our own identities and culture. Look also at the use of the term Mahnmale - why does this word, and what it represents, not exist in the English language? You can read more on these two conflicting approaches to the past, and how MacGregor believes knowledge about the past should be presented, in this article.
Source: Guardian
2. Strange memories
AoKs/WoKs: Memory, human sciences
KQs: Do memories require photographs to keep them alive?
Description: “as among all snapshots, there is a broader connection too. Walker describes it as a shared relationship to time. “Every person in a photo is older than when that photo was taken,” she elaborated. “I look at a photo and I know someone is probably dead and that one day I'll be dead too. There must be some secret of time held in these images. I can’t help thinking that if I just study them hard enough, I'll finally be able to understand it.”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: The Atlantic
3. Privilege strutting
AoKs/WoKs: Language, ethics
KQs: Does our word choice indicate our ethical perspective?
Description: “Bollywood actress Priyanka Chopra has apologised after being criticised for modelling an "insensitive" top on a Conde Nast Traveller magazine cover. The top has the words "migrant", "refugee" and "outsider" crossed out while the word "traveller" stands out. Both the actress and Conde Nast were criticised over the "privileged" message, with many pointing out that being a refugee was "not a choice". Conde Nast told the BBC their intention was to highlight labelling of people.”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: BBC
4. Three parent family
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, natural sciences
KQs: How are our ethical views shaped by our perspectives?
Description: “The headlines earlier this week that a baby had been born using DNA from three people got the world very excited… While the little boy isn't the first baby to be created by combining DNA from three people, the method used is a new and significant one that experts say could help families with rare genetic conditions to conceive healthy babies… But it's not such an easy solution. While specialists are calling it breakthrough technology, critics of assisted reproductive technology (ART) warn doctors about playing God.”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: BBC
5. Allure of swearing
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences, ethics
KQs: What makes a swear word offensive?
Description: “Whether you use “bad” language or not, it’s clear that this is a family of words with unique power. It’s not completely clear why. We’re not talking about slurs, foul language intended to denigrate someone or a group of people. We know where that power comes from — hate — and why it’s potent: It hurts people.”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: Big Think
6. Nostalgia as a way of knowing
AoKs/WoKs: History, human sciences, emotion
KQs: To what extent is our view of the past shaped by nostalgia?
Description: “Reactionaries, I argue, are nostalgic. They're thinking about a past that's been lost, and that past is always there. You may lose hope in a particular picture of the future, but you have a picture of the past that's untouchable, which is why I say... "Hopes can be extinguished but nostalgia is irrefutable."
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: Vox
7. Self portrait
AoKs/WoKs: The arts
KQs: To what extent can a person’s ‘essence’ be captured in a portrait?
Description: “Even when Picasso moved decisively away from descriptive naturalism, there is never any sense that he is slighting his human subjects. Instead, he sought always to find the details that made individuals instantly recognisable to themselves and to others.”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: The Guardian
8. Qualified artist
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: What does the change to the meaning of words over time reveal about society?
Description: “We all need them, but some, like me, love words, and the mind feast they bring. But while words shape our lives, few grasp the weird way they work… Words “won't—and can't—sit still (like, literally),” declares John McWhorter (Words On The Move).”
Discussion points, exploration, first order knowledge questions, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the TOK premium newsletter
Source: Big Think
Also included in August's premium newsletter...
7 more big real life situations, prompting us to ask -
- What does the change to the meaning of words over time reveal about society?
- Is quantitative data always more objective than qualitative data?
- Is our intuitive knowledge about the world always flawed?
- Why does the meaning of words change when they are transplanted to a different culture?
- Can we ever have too much data?
- How does implicit bias influence the way we understand the world?
- How can we know about the structure of the universe?
- Why did people believe the advice of this video?
- Can we determine if intelligence is due to nature or nurture?
- Can mathematics help us to understand football?
- What can we learn about a culture from its sayings?
- Why do we think emojis were a recent invention?
The Premium TOK Newsletter
The new TOK newsletter presentation
The prmium newsletter now comes accompanied by a Google Slides Presentation. This features all 15 of the main stories from this month's newsletter, arranged on two slides per real life situation, enabling you to explore each one in a convenient and visual manner with your class.
To see a sample of the presentation, featuring the first of the stories from October, click on the image below, then select the 'Make a copy' option in the 'File' tab, which will allow you to save your own version to your Drive folder, and then make any changes to suit whatever you are currently covering in TOK.
We hope you and your students enjoy this new addition to the TOK newsletter!
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
- An introduction to TOK (how TOK is assessed)
- The nature of knowledge (rationalism and empricism)
- A way of knowing (sense perception)
- An area of knowledge (the arts)
- Assessment advice (the TOK essay)
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2016 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
theoryofknowledge.net
12 Magrath Avenue
Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
Add us to your address book
unsubscribe from this list update subscription preferences
explore September's key events & issues?
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the September edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
For the very first time, this month's premium newsletter comes accompanied by a Google Slides presentation, enabling you to explore each story in a more convenient and visual way. Each RLS is presented on two slides, the first providing an introduction and image of story, and the second featuring an animated 'looking inside' slide, to help you to explore it in your class. We've provided a sample of this presentation with RLS number 1.
We are also releasing a brilliant and unique new resource for IB Diploma History - the Historical Investigation Pack (HIP). Created by highly experienced humanities educator Ned Riley, the pack is designed to support teachers delivering the new Historical Investigation. Download a sample of the pack by clicking on the link below. Find out more about the pack - and why your school is probably not doing enough to cater for this big curriculum change in history - here.
Download a free sample of the HIP
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we present the first RLS as it appears in the premium newsletter. If you would like to receive all the RLSs in this format, plus 7 additional 'big' RLSs and 5 'quick' RLSs, as well as the Google Slides presentation for the newsletter, upgrade to the premium newsletter by hitting the button below.
Upgrade to the Premium TOK Newsletter
1. Is knowledge still power?
AoKs/WoKs: The nature of knowledge, human sciences, technology
First order KQs: How has Google become one of the world’s most important companies?
Second order KQs: Are we becoming more ‘meta-ignorant’, and what are the implications of this? Is thinking less important than it used to be?
Description: “Does knowledge matter any more? There’s a decent case that it doesn’t. In the 1950s economist Anthony Downs coined the concept of rational ignorance. In many situations, Downs observed, learning isn’t worth the bother. Most of us don’t learn car repair or medicine or accounting. Instead, we consult professionals when such expertise is needed – and that’s perfectly reasonable. Today, we’re outsourcing memory and knowledge to the internet. This is often a good thing, but it comes with a drawback. The cloud is making us meta-ignorant: unaware of what we don’t know.”
Discussion points and exploration: Many articles are currently being written asking the question of whether Google has made ‘ordinary’ knowledge redundant. Why do we really need to know anything when we can just Google it? This article does cover that, but it also goes a little further. It asks: is Google making us ignorant of what we don’t actually know in the first place - and, therefore, what we need to learn in order to overcome our deficiencies?
Google Slides presentation: Follow this link. Select the 'Make a copy' option to download your own version to Google Drive.
Source: The Guardian
2. Collective amnesia
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, memory, history
KQs: Do fictional representations of events provide us with accurate insights into our feelings towards those events?
Description: “now, 15 years after 9/11, it feels like there’s a certain lack of self-awareness, perhaps because really looking back and scrutinizing the attacks and their fallout is too difficult for some people to bear. The result is a collective amnesia so prevalent that a huge slice of the population doesn’t even remember supporting the invasion of Iraq in the first place — or, by extension, how profoundly both the culture and the popular media we consumed changed in such a short amount of time. If we trace the metamorphosis of our pop cultural depictions of 9/11 in the 15 years that have passed since the tragedy, direct attempts to cope with the attacks eventually evolve into allegorical attempts. But depictions of 9/11 have not slowed or even stopped; merely changed shapes.”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Vox
3. Elusive dots
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, sense perception
KQs: Why do we find visual illusions so interesting?
Description: “Optical illusions might be one of the internet’s favourite things. And it just got a brand new one: a strange picture of overlapping grids that provides the ultimate combination of frustration and joy. The new illusion looks simple, showing intersecting grey lines on a white background. But looking closely starts it moving – and though there are actually 12 black dots in it, it’s only possible to see a few of them at each time.”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Independent
4. A moral education
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics
KQs: How do we acquire our ethical knowledge?
Description: “A couple of years ago, I taught a freshman English course in a suburban-rural school district with 32 students, 30 of whom were 15-year-old boys. I tried passionately to teach the need to “walk a mile in another man’s shoes,” as extolled by Atticus Finch, yet I continued to overhear racist and homophobic comments. One student even said, “That’s what guns are for” when I asked the class how they dealt with people who held different beliefs than they did.”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
5. Body detox
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, reason, language
KQs: Why do we believe that ‘detox’ products are beneficial?
Description: “The idea can be traced all the way back to the Garden of Eden: Almost as soon as we were created, we ate a toxic apple. Since then, perhaps to atone for this original sin, many of us have fallen prey to the idea that we are full of nasty, usually nebulously defined toxins in our bodies and we need to get rid of them to be purer, cleaner, and lighter.”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Vox
6. The instant
AoKs/WoKs: The nature of knowledge, natural and human sciences, mathematics
KQs: How does perception define the way we understand ‘instantaneous’?
Description: “How short is an “instant”? Is it a second? A tenth of a second? A microsecond? You might think all of these qualify. What about 100 years? That certainly doesn’t seem like an instant, and to a human being, it isn’t, since we’d be lucky to have a lifespan that long. But to a giant sequoia, say, 100 years is no big deal. And in geological terms it’s practically nothing. How should we make sense of the idea of an instant? Does it cloud our judgment when we make decisions, both as individuals and as a society?”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: The Conversation
7. Ethical tongue
AoKs/WoKs: Language, ethics, human sciences
KQs: How does our language determine our ethical identity?
Description: “What defines who we are? Our habits? Our aesthetic tastes? Our memories? If pressed, I would answer that if there is any part of me that sits at my core, that is an essential part of who I am, then surely it must be my moral center, my deep-seated sense of right and wrong. And yet, like many other people who speak more than one language, I often have the sense that I’m a slightly different person in each of my languages — more assertive in English, more relaxed in French, more sentimental in Czech. Is it possible that, along with these differences, my moral compass also points in somewhat different directions depending on the language I’m using at the time?”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: Salon
8. So Liddat Lor
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: What is the difference between a language, a dialect, and slang?
Description: “Singlish is the unofficial language – or dialect? or slang? – of Singapore, born out of the contact between the several cultures that make up the city state. It’s a living example of how languages can change and develop. It is also an expression of the Singaporean character and culture, a national treasure – or a detriment and danger to the country, depending on whom you ask.”
Discussion points & exploration, further KQs, and the Google Slides presentation: Upgrade to the premium newsletter!
Source: BBC
Also included in August's premium newsletter...
7 more big real life situations, prompting us to ask -
- How far can the same information be interpreted in different ways?
- Is art in the mind of the beholder?
- Which emotional state is most conducive to decision-making?
- Why do ethical outlooks change over time?
- Is consensus the proof of a discipline’s reliability?
- Why does it seem harder for people to think critically today?
- Why are established theories replaced?
- Why do our senses mislead us?
- Can you pray without being religious?
- What makes a painting a ‘great’ work of art?
- How do we judge whether something is ‘pseudo’ or ‘real’ science?
- Do skeptics demand ‘too much’ evidence?
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The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
- An introduction to TOK (how TOK is assessed)
- The nature of knowledge (rationalism and empricism)
- A way of knowing (sense perception)
- An area of knowledge (the arts)
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TED Companion (complete edition)
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
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explore July's events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the July edition of the theoryofknowledge.net newsletter
Because it’s the beginning of the new academic year for many schools around the world, we'd like to help you kick off your TOK lessons in style, by providing you with the premium version of the newsletter as a gift. You’ll find fifteen engaging real life situations, discussion points to provide a focus for exploration, and possible knowledge questions related to them (including a comparison of first and second order KQs). We also offer a fully-resourced knowledge controversy, centred around a man who is proving to be an invaluable asset to TOK classes around the world.
If you’d like to continue to receive the premium newsletter, as well as having access to back issues all the way back to November 2014 (providing you with more than 400 different RLSs), then follow this link to our resources shop, where you can find out more and purchase a subscription for your school.
We’d also like to remind you that our new TOK Sessions Pack is available for download. This is our biggest resource for teaching TOK, comprising well over 100 lesson plans on all aspects of the course, including an introduction to the course, the nature of knowledge, and support on writing the TOK essay and designing the presentation.
Every lesson plan within the teaching pack includes a starter activity, a clearly defined lesson objective, assessment tasks, and a PowerPoint to accompany ideas being covered. You can also purchase an extra Learning Pack, which provides a student handout for every session, a cover sheet for all the elements of the course, a list of sample knowledge questions, and key ideas and thinkers. You can download a free sample of the pack, which includes 5 different sessions, here, and find out more about how to purchase the pack here.
News stories & knowledge questions
1. Consequences of bias
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, reason, intuition, memory
First order KQs: How many people on both ‘sides’ have died as a result of problems between the police and civilians this year in the USA?
Second order KQs: What are the implications of confirmation bias? Which way of knowing is responsible for our ‘first impressions’? How can we overcome confirmation bias?
Description: “Alton Sterling and Philando Castile were shot to death by police officers this week. Both were calm… Underneath the ugliness and tragedy of their deaths is the fact that the officers who killed them made the decision to do so in a split-second -- based entirely on implicit biases… implicit bias -- an unintentional action rooted in prejudicial cognitive bias -- causes more trouble than it sounds like it should. It’s the root part of your brain that assesses everything you absorb from the world around you -- smells, tastes, people, feelings -- and categorizes them into experiences -- good, bad, scary, happy -- for easy recall.”
Discussion points and exploration: As with any major human sciences problem, the violence that is occurring in the United States between police and civilians is something that we are desperately trying to explain. Theories abound - the breakdown of morality in society, the increase of fear amongst ordinary people, the inadequate police training, the amount of guns in circulation and accessible to anyone who wants them. This article looks at a more elemental reason for what’s happening: our natural biases that may have helped early humans to survive, but now act detrimentally to divide society. Is this the key reason for explaining what’s going on? Can we overcome these biases?
Source: Big Think
2. Anybody out there?
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, natural sciences
First order KQs: What are the popular theories that UFOs exist?
Second order KQs: Why do people believe in the theories that UFOs exist? Is our need to believe in something more potent than our ability to be rational about issues? Is truth about potential or actual realities?
Description: “One thing the World UFO Day people are not is po-faced. They have some ideas on their website about how you can celebrate today, including making your own UFO t-shirts, taking pictures of strange objects in the sky (hey, if it’s going to happen on any day…) and throwing a UFO spotting party. It’s all rather jolly and has a bit of a Eurovision “guilty pleasure” vibe to it – though the exhortation to “create original-looking UFOs out of frisbees” doesn’t seem quite to be in the spirit of proving beyond a doubt the existence of alien life-forms.”
Discussion points and exploration: ‘UFOlogy’ is a huge industry, spawning books, TV series, films, and countless conspiracy theories. However, there are two ways of viewing ‘UFOlogists’ first, as people who have created a reality for themselves based on the desire to believe in something, rather than credible evidence. Second, as open-minded people for whom truth is as much about potential than it is about actual reality. There’s definitely scope for a class debate here!
Source: The Independent
3. Myth and reality
AoKs/WoKs: The nature of knowledge (etc.)
First order KQs: What are the most common misconceptions we hold about the world?
Second order KQs: Why do we have so many misconceptions about the world?
Description: “Thanks to the gods of the internet, a helpful soul has arisen and created for us a comprehensive chart of some of the frequently encountered “facts” and what they are in reality. Put together by the data journalist and information designer David McCandless, the chart chronicles research into the most common misconceptions or “myth conceptions” as he calls it.” [from Big Think]
Discussion points and exploration: This project by the ‘information is beautiful’ website is a lovely introduction to our knowledge in general, and leads on very effectively to a discussion of where and how we develop misconceptions about the world. How many misconceptions do students have? Which ones are most common? What’s causing us to develop such a skewed understanding of certain areas?
Source: Information is Beautiful
4. Looks tasty
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception
First order KQs: Which colours are associated with which tastes?
Second order KQs: Is taste dependent on vision? To what extent do the senses operate independently of each other? Does vision help or hinder taste?
Description: “Studies have proven that colour plays a vital role in setting our expectations of taste and flavour in foods. But what happens when colour defies expectation? We put food colouring into vanilla yoghurt and challenged people to guess the flavour. Will they all be duped or might someone see through our ruse?”
Discussion points and exploration: Not only does this help us to explore the limitations of our sense of taste (for a sense that plays such an important part in providing meaning to life, it is very easily misled), it also prompts us to explore the extent to which knowledge provided by sense perception is shaped by culture. This should be a surprise, given that we think of the senses as being one of the ‘rawer’ ways of knowing, but the experiment seems to suggest otherwise...
Source: The Guardian
5. Art vs materialism
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, human sciences
First order KQs: How did Michael Landy destroy all of his possessions?
Second order KQs: Do we see art “through the prism of our current concerns”? Does the meaning of art depend on who is looking at it?
Description: “We see artworks through the prism of our current concerns,” explains James Lingwood, who commissioned Break Down, and has just celebrated 25 brilliant years as co-director of Artangel. “The insistent pressures on people to consume have become more and more present in our culture, and there is an increasing feeling of discomfort about how alienating these pressures can be. Michael, through Break Down, put his finger on a deeply troubling part of our contemporary condition.”
Discussion points and exploration: The perennial ‘what is art’ question can be explored through countless paintings, musical compositions, and sculptures. But what really tests our definition is by looking at conceptual or performance art, like Michael Landy’s. This story also raises the question of the relationship between the artist and the audience, and the role of the latter in defining and giving meaning to what the artist creates. How many different interpretations of ‘Break Down’ will your students have?
Source: BBC
6. Mass of the soul
AoKs/WoKs: Religious knowledge systems, natural sciences
First order KQs: How has our conception of ‘the soul’ developed over time?
Second order KQs: Why do some people seek to use scientific methods to demonstrate religious phenomena?
Description: “In 1901, one of the most famous metaphysical experiments of the 20th century was performed by a Massachusetts physician. His name was Duncan MacDougall, and he believed that, if the soul were real, it should have measurable weight. He therefore attempted to compare the weights of patients before and after death. After testing six patients dying of tuberculosis, he concluded that dying results in the small but measurable loss of ¾ of an ounce – the weight of the soul.”
Discussion points and exploration: The question of whether humans have a soul, and therefore consist of two distinct entities (physical and spiritual) has kept philosophers busy for a long time. This article looks at that famous test carried out in 1901 that sought to settle the debate with scientific proof. Although it seems rather clumsy and naive now, it nonetheless prompts us to consider the way in which metaphysical questions are explored, and whether we can draw on one area of knowledge to offer an insight into another distinct and often contradictory one.
Source: The Conversation
7. Trending science
AoKs/WoKs: Technology, human and natural sciences
First order KQs: How widespread is the reporting of science by social media?
Second order KQs: Does social media help us to communicate, or prevent us from accurately conveying knowledge?
Description: “The problem is that social media is also a great way to spread misinformation, too. Millions of Americans shape their ideas on complex and controversial scientific questions – things like personal genetic testing, genetically modified foods and their use of antibiotics – based on what they see on social media. Even many traditional news organizations and media outlets report incomplete aspects of scientific studies, or misinterpret the findings and highlight unusual claims. Once these items enter into the social media echo chamber, they’re amplified. The facts become lost in the shuffle of competing information, limited attention or both.”
Discussion points and exploration: Given the prominence of social media in disseminating the news, we should never stop questioning the effect it has on the accuracy of what is being reported. This article focuses on journalism related to science, which arguably requires even more objectivity than other areas, but which is being affected in much the same way as them, with reliability being sacrificed for immediacy. Should science be reported in this way? How can we prevent inaccuracies creeping into the reporting of science?
Source: The Conversation
8. Art and ambiguity
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, human sciences
First order KQs: What are the key themes of poetry?
Second order KQs: How does poetry help us to understand the ambiguity of the world?
Description: “...poetry shows us that the world is “Crazier and more of it than we think,/Incorrigibly plural”, as Louis MacNeice writes in “Snow”; but it also allows us the consolations of a formal pattern that means nothing beyond itself. The form of a rhyming couplet can allude to its hundreds upon hundreds of predecessors; it can imply the poet’s technical training; it can even mime the “coupling” of lovers, as when they “get together” at the end of a sonnet or a sestina. But it does not itself mean anything.”
Discussion points and exploration: Although it’s not perhaps novel to view the arts in general, and poetry in particular, as sources of knowledge about existence and being, this article looks at the form of poetry, as well as its themes, in helping us to understand the world. Is it right in claiming that it helps us to grasp the unpredictability and ambiguity of the world? If so, should everyone draw more on poetry in order to relate better to others, and develop a more accepting approach to life?
Source: New Humanist
9. Conflict of diagnosis
AoKs/WoKs: Human and natural sciences
First order KQs: What is ‘environmental illness’?
Second order KQs: How should we decide whether ‘environmental illness’ exists? Who is the authority on the way our minds and bodies work: us, or the medical industry? How can we tell where the line is between hypochondria and illness?
Description: “A lot of things caused Susie pain: scented products, pesticides, plastic, synthetic fabrics, smoke, electronic radiation – the list went on. Back in “the regular world”, car exhaust made her feel sick for days. Perfume gave her seizures. Then she uprooted to Snowflake, Arizona. “I got out of the car and didn’t need my oxygen tank,” she said, grinning at me in the rearview mirror. “I could walk.”
Discussion points and exploration: This is a fascinating story, which does not, perhaps, initially seem to link strongly to TOK. But the more you read about and listen to the story of the residents of Snowflake, you realise there is a big debate being waged here - about who should decide on the legitimacy of a medical condition. Should it be the people who claim to suffer from it, and sense its presence directly? Or the scientific community, who require other forms of evidence before they accept that it is real?
Source: The Guardian
10. Everyday morality
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, human sciences
First order KQs: What were David Hume’s key philosophical ideas?
Second order KQs: Is our judgement of what represents ‘correct’ behaviour based on normality?
Description: “In a series of studies, psychologist Andrei Cimpian and I investigated why people use the status quo as a moral codebook – a way to decipher right from wrong and good from bad. Our inspiration for the project was philosopher David Hume, who pointed out that people tend to allow the status quo (“what is”) to guide their moral judgment… Just because a behavior or practice exists, that doesn’t mean it’s good – but that’s exactly how people often reason.”
Discussion points and exploration: The key question at the centre of this article is where we gain our moral code from, and how we decide what is the ‘right’ way of behaving. Specifically, it looks at how this is strongly influenced by what we judge as being ‘normal’, without weighing up whether ‘normal’ behaviour is ethically valid or not. Does this prove that we are lazy moralists? Can it shed light on why so many of us are unwilling to contribute to charity, support people in need of help, and view with suspicion those whose experiences are dissimilar to our own?
Source: The Conversation
11. Reasonable odds?
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, human sciences, ethics
First order KQs: What is ‘lottery addiction’?
Second order KQs: Why do people spend money on lottery tickets? Do we make our decisions based on reason?
Description: “The chances of winning the US lottery are 250 million to one, and in some cases higher. It’s not a small game of poker against some friends, instead it’s gambling against every citizen who buys a ticket. And perhaps it’s not much; two dollars to play each time. But the money adds up, and there are even cases of lottery addiction.”
Discussion points and exploration: This is a quick video that deals with the phenomenon of people who play the lottery. Given that the chances of winning are basically negligible, and that handing over your money for a ticket is akin to throwing it away, why do people take part?
Source: Big Think
12. Political projections
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
First order KQs: What are Donald Trump’s key political ideas?
Second order KQs: To what extent do we project our own ideology onto the politicians we have chosen to support?
Description: “Every successful politician succeeds by acting, to some degree, by allowing themselves to look like a blank screen on which a wide range of voters can project their own hopes and dreams. The clumsier politicians risk the appearance of pandering. Smoother ones manage to simply stay vague enough to convince voters they’re with them, although that can cause problems later.”
Discussion points and exploration: Donald Trump is a godsend to TOK teachers, and the more bizarre his comments become, the more he becomes an integral part of the way we explore reason, emotion, language, human sciences, and other aspects of the course. This article looks at how his supporters construct their own reality of what he stands for and represents, by projecting their own ideology onto what he stands for. Does this explain how politics works in general? Or is Trump unique in this respect, just as he seems unique in others?
Source: The Atlantic
13. Wish fulfilment
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, religious knowledge systems, humans sciences, emotion
First order KQs: How do con artists trick their victims?
Second order KQs: To what extent are belief systems based on need? What role does cause and effect play in how we try to understand the world?
Description: “The world is often arbitrary in its motions, and there isn’t always meaning to be found. This gap in meaning is where con artist, cult leaders and spiritual advisors walk in. [Maria] Konnikova [popular psychology writer] has spoken before about con artists, and how they work. One big thing she pointed out is that con artists listen, and “solve” people’s problems by giving them what they desire.”
Discussion points and exploration: Why people should subsume their own identities and beliefs within a cult or religious group is a fascinating question. Konnikova provides a nice guide to techniques used by such organisations, and compares their strategies with those of a con artist. How widely can we apply this analysis?
Source: Big Think
14. Seeing is believing
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, sense perception, human sciences
First order KQs: What part has social media played in widening of the police killings scandal in the USA?
Second order KQs: Why do we need to see an ethical issue in order to truly understand it?
Description: “What makes these deaths [Philando Castile and Alton Sterling] different—what makes them subjects of public grief, warranting a Facebook post from the president—is that they were filmed. Alton Sterling and Philando Castile became news not because of the uniqueness of what happened to them, but because a camera documented their suffering and death. Journalists, lawmakers, and the public see the footage, and they believe.”
Discussion points and exploration: In some ways, this RLS has a lot in common with the concept at the heart of Peter Singer’s ethical immediacy idea (explained in his very moving TED talk) - in other words, it’s not enough to merely hear about a moral problem in order to act on it, we have to see or experience it for ourselves. With the advent of technology designed to facilitate communication via social media, we are now more easily able to do exactly this. It is well worth exploring the implications of this technology - will it enhance or inhibit our understanding of ethical issues and events going on in the world?
Source: The Atlantic
15. The new language
AoKs/WoKs: Language, intuition, technology
First order KQs: How have emojis developed over the last 5 years?
Second order KQs: Do emojis represent a new language?
Description: “Like many people who are fond of texting, I spend a lot of time hunting for the perfect emoji. Although I’m particularly fond of the “loudly crying face” 😭 and fire 🔥 emojis, it’s often hard to find an image that precisely captures how I feel, especially in the moments I need one the most; when I’m feeling exhausted or angry or insecure, I usually don’t want to spend 10 minutes scrolling neurotically through over a thousand images to determine whether an upside-down smiley face or a taco best represents my emotional state. Thanks in part to the massive popularity of emojis, several tech companies are exploring ways not only to make finding emojis easier, but to predict which ones you may want to use.”
Discussion points and exploration: We’ve explored stories before on emojis, but the sophistication with which they are being used is advancing so quickly that it really seems like they offer us a whole new way of communicating with each other. Why are they so popular - is it because people are too lazy to communicate using the more laborious process of writing? Or is it because they are superior to words in expressing emotions and ideas?
Source: Five Thirty Eight
Quick stories
E1. Problems of cutenessAoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
KQs: To what extent is our behaviour influenced by ‘cuteness’?
Source: The Independent
E2. The job of the artist
AoKs/WoKs: The arts
KQs: What is the job of the artist?
Source: Big Think
E3. Closet philosophyAoKs/WoKs: H.sciences, s.perception
KQs: Where is the line between neuroscience and philosophy?
Source: Big Think
E4. Death metalAoKs/WoKs: The arts, human sciences
KQs: How does heavy metal help us to cope with mortality?
Source: The Independent
E5. Curious instinct
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion
KQs: Are curiosity and happiness mutually exclusive?
Source: The Guardian
Knowledge controversies
Click on the image to take you to the video. Watch from 5.55 - 8.51.
Should political leaders use arguments based on logic?
One of the most useful aspects of the TOK course is the training it gives students on constructing arguments. The basis of arguing or debating effectively is using objective evidence to justify opinions, rather than relying on assertions that are based on logical fallacies. Understanding what a logical fallacy is can be an epoch-making event for many students, and identifying them in everyday conversations, the sales pitches of advertising campaigns, and the rhetoric of politicians’ speeches is an immensely empowering skill.
We have, arguably, never before lived in a time when logical fallacies are so prevalent. Entire political campaigns are built on them, in all countries of the world (see our take on Brexit from last month), but given the importance of US elections, it’s worth looking at what’s happening there. Although logical fallacies are found within speeches and promises made by both parties, we are going to focus on the GOP.
Based on the excellent YouTube Channel Teach Argument, we present the speech given by Donald Trump announcing his decision to stand as the presidential nominee for the Republican Party. Although this runs for around 45 minutes, you only need to watch the first three minutes of the speech, from 5.55 - 8.51. The task for students is simple: identify how many logical fallacies are used during this section of the speech.
Follow this link for an outline of different fallacies (all of them, except - perhaps surprisingly - the ad hominem fallacy appear during the three minutes; although you can find a good example of that one during a debate against Jeb Bush here),this link for a transcript of the three minutes, and this link for where the logical fallacies appear.
Follow up tasks could include a consideration of whether it matters - does the construction of an argument based on ad hominem attacks, slippery slope reasoning, and appeals to emotion disqualify a person from high office? What are the ethical implications of the increase in use of logical fallacies? What does it say about our education system that logical fallacies are increasingly accepted or not spotted by people? Should we train students more in debate and argument?
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The NEW TOK Sessions Pack
Our new TOK Sessions Pack is a truly special resource. It offers well over 100 lesson plans covering all aspects the course. Every lesson plan includes a starter activity, a PowerPoint presentation, a single, clearly defined and measured objective, assessment tasks, and step-by-step instructions on delivery.
You can download a free sample of the new pack by following this link. The sample includes 5 different sessions, covering the following topics in TOK:
- An introduction to TOK (how TOK is assessed)
- The nature of knowledge (rationalism and empricism)
- A way of knowing (sense perception)
- An area of knowledge (the arts)
- Assessment advice (the TOK essay)
Find out more about the new TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion (complete edition)
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companion
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2016 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
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explore February's news events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resources educate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the February edition of the theoryofknowledge.net premium newsletter.
March represents that ‘handover’ month in TOK when Northern hemisphere schools submit their essays, and Southern hemisphere schools receive the six prescribed titles, so we wish students at both ends of the writing process the very best of luck.
This month’s knowledge controversy, found in the premium newsletter, is about accessibility to knowledge, particularly that related to science. We invite subscribers to think about the pros and cons of making scientific research more available via the Internet, and the implications of this on our understanding of the world.
We’ll soon be announcing the release of our two newest resources: Great Minds on TOK, and the New TOK Sessions. As the size and scope of both of them has grown beyond our original plans, we’ve pushed back the publication date, but they should be coming out at the end of this month or early in April.
In the meantime, you might like to check out new resources offered by our friends at Cambridge University Press, in particular, their unique CAS course book. Find out more here.
Our app for both iOS and Android is available by following the links below.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we provide our first real life situation as it is presented in the premium newsletter. The premium newsletter also includes 12 extra RLSs, and other features to help students engage with TOK. To upgrade your subscription, hit the button below.
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1. The study of ignorance
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, the nature of knowledge, language, history
Could also be used in: Subjects within Individuals and societies, and Sciences
First order KQs: What does ‘agnotology’ mean?
Second order KQs: How do we distinguish between balanced debate, and the deliberate spread of ignorance? What conditions are needed for the spread of ignorance?
Description: “agnotology… comes from agnosis, the neoclassical Greek word for ignorance or ‘not knowing’, and ontology, the branch of metaphysics which deals with the nature of being. Agnotology is the study of wilful acts to spread confusion and deceit, usually to sell a product or win favour.”
Discussion points: The real life situation at the heart of this article is about Robert Proctor, and his attempt to explore the history of agnotology. His story tells us a great deal about the search for knowledge, and the way in which big companies, and other agencies, often try to prevent us from doing this successfully. It’s interesting to us for what it says about the methods of ‘spreading ignorance’ - look, for example, at how the ‘disagreement of experts’ is used as a way of creating a ‘false picture of truth’.
Further exploration: An obvious extension task would be to find further examples of how big companies and political groups have used these techniques to spread information. Start with tobacco firms, move on to climate change deniers, and finish up with looking at the presidential primaries. Do you agree, overall, with his analysis that ‘ignorance is power’, or, that ‘knowledge is accessible but not accessed’?
Source: BBC
2. Ethical arts
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, ethics
KQs: What role do the arts play in shaping our ethical outlooks?
Description: “In one of her final interviews, given in 1964, Harper Lee, who has died at the age of 89, explained: “I would like to leave some record of the kind of life that existed in a very small world. I hope to do this in several novels: to chronicle something that seems to be very quickly going down the drain. This is small-town middle-class southern life ... I believe that there is something universal in this little world, something decent to be said for it, and something to lament in its passing.””
For discussion points, further exploration, and other subjects related to this: Upgrade here to our premium newsletter!
Source: The Guardian
3. Information war
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, reason, emotion, intuition
KQs: Why are rational explanations often less attractive than irrational ones?
Description: “As scientists race for answers about the Zika virus and its links to neurological disorders, rumours are filling the vacuum. Genetically modified (GM) mosquitoes, expired vaccines and more recently, the use of larvicide to stop mosquitoes from breeding, have all been blamed. Posts on social media expressing these theories have been widely shared - although rarely by respected scientists. And Brazil's health authorities have been caught off guard, describing the frenzy as a "real information war" with a "complex scenario of actors, interests and worldviews".
For discussion points, further exploration, and other subjects related to this: Upgrade here to our premium newsletter!
Source: BBC
4. Memory restoration
AoKs/WoKs: Memory
KQs: What are the ethical (and psychological) implications of remembering everything?
Description: “...forgetting isn’t just a loss that comes with age. It’s a normal part of the memory process. We don’t need to remember a lot of what happens to us – what we made for dinner two years ago, where we left the car the last five times we parked in this lot. Those are examples of things that aren’t useful to remember anymore.”
For discussion points, further exploration, and other subjects related to this: Upgrade here to our premium newsletter!
Source: The Conversation
5. Sound in history
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception, history, the arts
KQs: Do we neglect a consideration of sense perception when we study the past?
Description: “The music of the Byzantine era, she decided, was a key to understanding her area of expertise—and not just the music itself, but understanding the experience of hearing it, and what it would have been like 700 years ago. “As an art historian, I could look at the pictures and say, ‘this is a nice painting of the hymn,’ but I couldn’t say anything about how the audience perceived that painting within a ritual setting.”
For discussion points, further exploration, and other subjects related to this: Upgrade here to our premium newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
6. Spelling and identity
AoKs/WoKs: Language, history
KQs: Do dictionaries stifle self-expression?
Description: “How we turn thoughts and experiences into speech and text will always be idiosyncratic. It used to be more so: people wrote as they spoke, so variation in dialect begat variation in text. With the printing press came partial standardisation. We don’t call eggs eyren, but it could easily have been otherwise. English after Caxton was gradually codified but remained heterogeneous and subject to constant change and stresses. That it drifted more in spoken than written form is another reason for the disparity between its spelling and pronunciation.”
For discussion points, further exploration, and other subjects related to this: Upgrade here to our premium newsletter!
Source: History Today
7. Subjectivity of pain
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception
KQs: Is pain a subjective or objective experience?
Description: “How badly affected someone is by a health issue depends on how it is perceived by the individual, and there are so many things that can influence this, even if it’s quite an obvious physical issue. Take pain, the most obvious problem resulting from a physical health issue. How do you measure, objectively, how much pain someone is in?”
For discussion points, further exploration, and other subjects related to this: Upgrade here to our premium newsletter!
Source: The Guardian
8. Imagination versus science
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, natural sciences
KQs: Can science be used to understand the arts?
Description: “Seeing such things in art is what we do when we go to galleries; it is a subjective and subtle process of discovery. Now that relationship has been short-circuited by misused science. To “prove” by chemical analysis of his colours that Van Gogh’s expressive art reflects his evolving (and after 1888, downwardly spiralling) moods is pompously to state as a scientific discovery what any sensitive beholder can see for themselves. In fact, it is more dangerous than that because this kind of clumsy use of new research technologies erodes our ability to look for ourselves.”
For discussion points, further exploration, and other subjects related to this: Upgrade here to our premium newsletter!
Source: The Guardian
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
7 more detailed real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
- How have our ideas about diverse groups of people been affected by the concept of ‘average’?
- Why do discredited knowledge claims become popular again?
- What is the difference between opinion and fact?
- Can a more diverse vocabulary for colour affect the way we see those colours?
- Can scientific reviews be carried out without an agenda?
- Is the selfie the cultural form of the Internet?
- Should we allow mathematical algorithms to determine ethical decisions?
... and 5 ‘quick’ real life situations, helping you to consider:
- Did a fear of God lead to the establishment of human civilisation?
- Does language change society's outlooks and values?
- Do we make lists because we don't want to die?
- Can neuroscience help us to understand the US presidential election?
- How accurately do we reconstruct the world?
We also consider another essential contemporary knowledge controversy, with links to articles outlining the position of both sides, key figures involved, and questions on the implications of the debate.
Upgrade to the premium newsletter by hitting the button below.
Upgrade to the premium TOK newsletter
An introduction to the areas of knowledge
Our second video for Cambridge University Press, briefly introducing the areas of knowledge, can be seen by clicking on the image below.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The TOK Sessions Pack
The awesome TOK Sessions pack is now being used by hundreds of educators around the world to deliver the TOK course, and help students understand the assessment tasks.
The pack contains 85 lesson plans for all the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing, introductory lessons on TOK, plenary sessions for the end of the course, and suggestions on how to explain the essay and presentation.
Purchase the TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion (complete edition)
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companions
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2016 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
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Using TOK to understand January's news
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the January edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
Welcome to January premium TOK newsletter. There has been a great deal in the press during the last month about the coverage of scientific issues, and the reliability of reporting of this area of knowledge, so we include coverage of several of these stories.
After positive feedback from subscribers, we continue this month to provide a suggestion in the premium newsletter for which IB Diploma subjects each RLS would work well in. So if you’re a TOK or IBDP coordinator, have a quick look through the second section of the RLSs this month, and pass on the stories you think other teachers might be able to use, both as a way of promoting TOK throughout your school, and as a way of enriching other classes.
Our app for both iOS and Android is available by following the links below.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we provide our first real life situation as it is presented in the premium newsletter. The premium newsletter also includes 12 extra RLSs, and other features to help students engage with TOK. To upgrade your subscription, hit the button below.
Upgrade to the premium subscription
1. Imagination versus research
AoKs/WoKs: History, imagination, the arts, reason, emotion
Can also be used in: History, Studies in language and literature
First order KQs: How do societal trends affect the way we gather historical knowledge? Why does the way historians work change over time?
Second order KQs: Is imagination a valid way of knowing for the historian? Can fictional accounts of the past provide us with real knowledge? Does historical enquiry have to be based on extensive research?
Description: “How do historians justify what they do? Certainly they can no longer pretend to Olympian distance and uninterested authority. We are all a product of the times we live in, fed by the oxygen of our experiences, and it is disingenuous to claim otherwise. We live in a multi-channel, multi-vocal era, which is sceptical of singularity and authority, but paradoxically attracted to narrow certainties and averse to self-doubt. How should historians adapt their practice to reflect these competing tensions?”
Discussion points: The nature of history is often one debated between those who argue it is more of an art, and those who argue it is a science. Although it undoubtedly borrows approaches from both these areas of knowledge, the heart of the question concerns the extent to which we need to ‘fill in the gaps’ using our imagination. Is this valid if we want to access the truth about the past? Or should those gaps be left if there isn’t enough solid evidence to allow us to explore them? And how does this fit in with our ‘multi-channel, multi-vocal era’?
Further exploration: Compare and contrast the way in which history used to be written (by consulting works written 50 years ago or more), and how it is today. What are the key differences? Why is this? How has history changed as a result of the Internet, and methods of communicating knowledge about the past? Think in terms of the ways of knowing that are used in order to access historical knowledge.
Source: History Today
2. Best countries on earth?
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, mathematics
KQs: What are the limits of statistics in terms of providing us with knowledge?
Description: “Just as we have done with universities, hospitals and other institutions, our Best Countries portal will be a global homepage for stories and data to help citizens, business leaders and governments evaluate performance in a rapidly changing world,” Mortimer B. Zuckerman, chairman and editor-in-chief of U.S. News, said in a statement. The publication is known the world over for many of its rankings.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Independent
3. Emotional labels
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, language
KQs: Does labelling an emotion allow us to control it?
Description: “Unusual emotions routinely swirl within us, and they aren't easily named. But it may be useful to stop, examine them, and try to put them into words. "When we label an emotion, it might make it more manageable," says Seth J. Gillihan, a clinical assistant professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. "It might not change the emotion, but it does allow us the possibility of choosing our response."
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: Psychology Today
4. Mathematical science
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, mathematics, sense perception
KQs: Which provides more certain knowledge: mathematics, or sense perception?
Description: “The scientists who made headlines this week by announcing evidence for a new planet in our solar system are basing the claim entirely on a mathematical model. Nobody’s seen the thing, but the math says it’s there. This isn’t the first time scientists have found a new planet before really finding it, but this technique also has produced outright blunders. This time, though, astronomers say there’s reason to take the new potential planet seriously.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: FiveThirtyEight
5. Cannabis and IQ
AoKs/WoKs: Natural & human sciences, ethics
KQs: At what point should we trust scientific data?
Description: “Whether or not using cannabis can lead to cognitive impairment is a hot topic of research and public interest. Given the extensive media attention granted to findings that suggest detrimental effects of cannabis on cognition, brain function andmental health, you would be forgiven for thinking smoking a spliff was akin to repeatedly bashing yourself over the head with a giant bong. However, since much of the work to date is cross-sectional (that is, measurements are taken only at one time in a person’s life), we cannot know whether cannabis users would have performed any differently before they started using cannabis. In short, we’re faced with a classic “chicken or egg” problem.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
6. Nutritional advice
AoKs/WoKs: Natural and human sciences
KQs: Should we trust the data produced by scientific surveys and questionnaires?
Description: “When it comes to nutrition, everyone has an opinion. What no one has is an airtight case. The problem begins with a lack of consensus on what makes a diet healthy. Is the aim to make you slender? To build muscles? To keep your bones strong? Or to prevent heart attacks or cancer or keep dementia at bay? Whatever you’re worried about, there’s no shortage of diets or foods purported to help you. Linking dietary habits and individual foods to health factors is easy — ridiculously so.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: FiveThirtyEight
7. There are more things in heaven and earth...
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, natural sciences, imagination, ethics
KQs: Can we rely on knowledge that is not supported by demonstrable evidence?
Description: “So if we can’t prove or disprove astrology by seeing predictions either play out or fail to materialize, how can we test it and trust it? “That question comes from our modern rational Western worldview that deems what’s true is based on data and scientific results,” says Cox. “Astrology is a symbolic system, it doesn’t operate within that Western framework and our astrologers aren’t trying to demonstrate that. There are other ways to be in the world.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Independent
8. Commercial science
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, ethics
KQs: What are the implications of the commercialization of university research?
Description: “As it turns out, the maker of Fifth Quarter Fresh chocolate milk — which comes from a dairy cooperative in Hagerstown, Maryland — funded 10 percent of the study, and the university funded the rest. So here we have a milk manufacturer working in partnership with the University of Maryland to fund a sloppy study, and the university then blasts the results, persuading schools and the press that this milk works wonders on students' brains.”
Discussion points and further exploration: See the premium newsletter.
Source: Vox
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
7 more detailed real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
- Does religion provide us with a literal or a metaphorical understanding of the world?
- Can visual art help us to access our memory?
- Is science affected by personal biases?
- Is our concept of time discovered or invented?
- Is our categorization of languages based on a misconception of what language is?
- Is legal truth the same as moral truth?
- Is the desire for news detrimental to our acquisition of the truth?
... and 5 ‘quick’ real life situations, helping you to consider:
- Can art reliably predict the scientific and technological future?
- Does our lack of knowledge of prime numbers indicate a lack of knowledge in general?
- What are the limits of our rationality?
- Do ‘self-help’ classes really help us?
- Is mathematics the ‘mind of God’?
Upgrade to the premium newsletter by hitting the button below.
Upgrade to the premium TOK subscription
An introduction to the areas of knowledge
Our second video for Cambridge University Press, briefly introducing the areas of knowledge, can be seen by clicking on the image below.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The TOK Sessions Pack
The awesome TOK Sessions pack is now being used by hundreds of educators around the world to deliver the TOK course, and help students understand the assessment tasks.
The pack contains 85 lesson plans for all the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing, introductory lessons on TOK, plenary sessions for the end of the course, and suggestions on how to explain the essay and presentation.
Purchase the TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion (complete edition)
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK and other IB Diploma subject concepts in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companions
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2016 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
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Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
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December's news events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the December edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
Although Christmas is over for another year, we’re starting this month’s edition with a consideration of the story of the birth of Jesus, and the way in which we visualise and understand the events surrounding it. We also think about several other stories that are closely related to religious knowledge systems.
We believe that TOK should be taught in all Diploma subject classes, as well as in specific TOK ones, and arguably the best way to do this is by exploring current events and issues that form the basis of our real life situations. Starting this month, our premium newsletter provides a suggestion for which IB Diploma subjects each RLS would work well in, giving you another reason to upgrade from the free to premium subscription.
We are very proud to announce that we are working alongside the world’s newest and most innovative new university, Minerva Schools, to promote several exciting initiatives. Minerva students spend four years of immersive global study with students living in up to 7 different world cities, and are encouraged to draw on critical thinking to tackle complex challenges.
In recognition of the fact that their pedagogy resonates so strongly with TOK, and our approach to it, we’re delighted that Minerva has dedicated one full tuition needs-based scholarship to a theoryofknowledge.net user. To find out more, and apply, visit the Minerva theoryofknowledge.net scholarship here. You can read a new post written for us by a Minerva (and former UWC) student on how TOK has helped her in her first undergraduate year.
Finally, two Minerva students will be travelling from London to Istanbul this month, and meeting with international students along the way to present a range of workshops based on the refugee crisis. If you’d like them to visit your school, let us know.
Our app for both iOS and Android is available by following the links below.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we provide our first real life situation as it is presented in the premium newsletter. The premium newsletter also includes 12 extra RLSs, and other features. To upgrade your subscription, hit the button below.
Upgrade to the premium subscription
1. Dreaming of a white Christmas
AoKs/WoKs: Religious knowledge systems, faith, history, reason, ethics, human sciences
Could also be used in: World religions, Social and cultural anthropology, History
First order KQs: How do different religions present origins stories?
Second order KQs: Are historical accuracy and faith incompatible within the context of religious knowledge systems? Should biblical stories be subject to historical scrutiny?
Description: “Christmas, like many other holidays, is a social ritual informed by some mix of religion and folklore. As you’d expect, many popular depictions of Jesus’s birth are filled with inaccuracies that conflict with the story told in the Bible—the supposed presence of “three kings,” Jesus’s birth in a stable, a fair-skinned holy family. Some are relatively harmless—the understandable result of centuries of obfuscation, speculation, and artistic reinvention. But it’s also time to let others go, or to at least broadly acknowledge their divergence from history.”
Discussion points: The story of the birth of Jesus is central to Western culture, and the holiday that is held to mark it is celebrated in virtually all countries around the world, regardless of their religious (or non-religious) outlooks. However, there is a great deal of uncertainty about the actual events that we commemorate, and the story that most of us think we know is very different to that supported by the evidence. But does this matter? Is faith the only way of knowing we should employ when taking part in Christmas? Or is the imagery of Christmas sometimes ethically unsound?
Further exploration: There is a great deal of scope for further exploration here: looking at different religions and societies, students could think about why there is sometimes a conflict between faith and an insistence on historical accuracy, and the extent to which religious knowledge systems are founded on actual, well-documented events, or on stories that are more mythological in nature. Some religious leadersassert that faith and reason are not only compatible, but also essential - how does this view fit into the way in which we approach the Christmas story and the origins of Jesus?
Source: The Atlantic
2. Circle psychology
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences
KQs: Can simple perceptive tests determine the answer to complex psychological questions?
Description: “A simple test has been devised that could determine your political outlook, according to a study. Researchers say those who see the shape above as a circle are more likely to have liberal political views. They say those people will probably be more inclined to want to help other humans and strongly support the idea of government aid for the homeless and unemployed.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: The Independent
3. History as empathy
AoKs/WoKs: History, emotion
KQs: Is the development of empathy “the quintessential underlying story of human history”?
Description: “Marx said that the fundamental driver of human history was the conflict between classes. Darwin believed it was the evolutionary struggle for survival. Others have claimed that the most important force for change is the clash of civilisations, the rise of political ideologies and religious movements, or advances in technology. A growing number of thinkers, however, are starting to recognise that empathy is an essential missing ingredient in these traditional narratives.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: New Humanist
4. One God?
AoKs/WoKs: Religious knowledge systems, faith
KQs: Do all religions have the same concept of God?
Description: “Do Muslims and Christians worship the same God? It’s a question that has bedeviled theologians and everyday believers for centuries. And this week it may have cost a tenured professor her job. Larycia Hawkins, an associate professor of political science at Wheaton College, was placed on administrative leave on Tuesday after suggesting that believers in the two faiths do indeed follow the same God.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
5. The Holy Bible
AoKs/WoKs: Religious knowledge systems, ethics, human sciences, emotion, reason
KQs: Why are we aware of other people’s prejudices more than our own?
Description: “A lot of conservative Christians like to argue, as do atheists, that the Qur’an is full of barbarism and misogyny. Unlike the atheists, though, they forget that their own Bible is also full of horrific verses.So the Dutch pranksters at Dit Is Normaalran an experiment. They bought a Bible, but changed the cover to say it’s the Qur’an. Then they asked people to read passages and give their thoughts.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: Patheos
6. Ethical responsibility of scientists
AoKs/WoKs: Natural sciences, ethics
KQs: Do scientists have an ethical responsibility for how their knowledge is used?
Description: “...computer science has quite a bit to do with reality. Its practitioners devise the surveillance systems that watch over nearly every space, public or otherwise—and they design the tools that allow for privacy in the digital realm. Computer science is political, by its very nature. That’s at least according to Phillip Rogaway, a professor of computer science at the University of California. ...Last week, Rogaway took his case directly to a roomful of cryptographers at a conference in Auckland, New Zealand. He accused them of a moral failure: By allowing the government to construct a massive surveillance apparatus, the field had abused the public trust. Rogaway said the scientists had a duty to pursue social good in their work.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
7. Scientists with faith
AoKs/WoKs: Faith, natural sciences, religious knowledge systems
KQs: Is religious faith compatible with a scientific outlook?
Description: “...it has puzzled me how anyone could be religious whilst also being a scientist. How can one hold what I saw as diametrically opposed belief systems? How, on the one hand, could someone devote themselves to the scientific methods where, through repeated experimentation, one builds up a self-consistent representation of the rules that govern the universe, whilst on the other hand believing in a force that existed outside the rules and that, indeed, could change those rules.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: New Humanist
8. Language and emotion
AoKs/WoKs: Language, emotion, human sciences
KQs: To what extent is emotion culture-specific?
Description: “At the same time, though, our emotions are also shaped by the world around us, and different cultures collectively experience emotions in different ways. Korea, for example, has han, or the state of feeling sad and hopeful at the same time. Finland, Denmark, and Norway all have their own terms for the specific kind of coziness that comes from being warm on a cold day, surrounded by loved ones.”
Discussion points and further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
What else comes in this month's PREMIUM NEWSLETTER?
7 more detailed real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
- Can we use historical methodology to understand emotions and feelings?
- Can we use the methods of naturalists to understand human behaviour?
- How does language use affect our perception of people and things?
- To what extent is the value of a work of art determined by its provenance?
- Should religious texts by taken literally or metaphorically?
- How certain can we be that inoculations have no link to autism?
- Is reason a flawed way of knowing when it comes to problem solving?
- Is serendipity responsible for the most important scientific discoveries?
- Do the arts define our culture?
- Are we intelligent enough to know our limitations?
- Is politics based on reason or emotion?
- Can anything be art?
UPGRADE TO THE PREMIUM NEWSLETTER
An introduction to the areas of knowledge
Our second video for Cambridge University Press, briefly introducing the areas of knowledge, can be seen by clicking on the image below.
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The TOK Sessions Pack
The awesome TOK Sessions pack is now being used by hundreds of educators around the world to deliver the TOK course, and help students understand the assessment tasks.
The pack contains 85 lesson plans for all the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing, introductory lessons on TOK, plenary sessions for the end of the course, and suggestions on how to explain the essay and presentation.
Purchase the TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion (complete edition)
Our inspirational TED Companion Pack (Complete Edition) presents TOK-related questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK concepts and ideas in an academic and social context.
The packs include a 169 page guide for teachers, student handouts, and an overview of the talks allowing you to present them either in or out of the classroom.
Purchase the TED Companions
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2016 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
theoryofknowledge.net
12 Magrath Avenue
Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
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October's news events
We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the October edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
We’ve been busy updating the site, adding many extra features to the site, such asmore videos, more sections within the different ways of knowing and areas of knowledge, an array of new real life situations, and more profiles on key thinkers from the past and present.
We’ve also been in the news. Michael was interviewed by the BBC World Service for a story they were running on the South Korean history textbook controversy, and he gave his thoughts on the mutable nature of history, and how this is sometimes exploited by governments. The interview was picked up by ABC of Australia, and can be heard here; the BBC web version of the story is here.
The TED Companion 2 will be coming out in mid-November, with 40 brand new talks. You can buy this as a separate edition, or purchase the Complete TED Companion, containing an enormous 100 of the most TOK-friendly TED talks, presented in a lesson compatible format. This the perfect way to introduce or consolidate students’ knowledge of the course, as well as hooking them up with the most influential contemporary thinkers, and modern knowledge debates.
Our app for both iOS and Android is available by following the links below.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we provide our first real life situation as it is presented in the premium newsletter. The premium newsletter also includes 12 extra RLSs, and other features. If you would like to receive this version, please upgrade below.
1. Correct history
AoKs/WoKs: History, human sciences
First order KQs: What have been the key events of South Korean history?
Second order KQs: Who should be responsible for the writing of history? Is there a ‘correct version’ of what happened in the past? How accessible is the truth about the past?
Description: “South Korea's government has announced a controversial plan to replace a variety of history books with a single textbook approved by the state…. By 2017, The Correct History Textbook will be the only history book allowed in South Korea's high schools. It will be written by a government-appointed panel of history teachers and academics. Opposition politicians and some students have already been protesting against the move, accusing the government of "distorting history".”
Discussion points: The story highlights a clash of two completely different perspectives: that of the South Korean government, which believes that it is possible to access the ‘truth’ about the past, and build a history textbook around it, and those who believe that history is based on different interpretations, which often change and develop as society moves forward. Think also about what the story reveals in terms of the importance governments place on history, and how it should be delivered to school pupils.
Further exploration: It’s worth listening to the podcast, as it contains a BBC interview with theoryofknowledge.net’s creator, Michael Dunn. He and the other commentators, note how other countries often struggle to present to control how the past is presented - look into Japan and USA and how they approach this issue. On the other hand, some countries, such as the UK, choose to make their history less controversial, with ‘hero or villain’ activities applied to very distant figures from their history whose ethical impact is felt a lot less. Whose approach is the best?
Source: ABC (Australia)
2. Trolley morality
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics
KQs: Can hypothetical situations help us to understand moral decision-making?
Description: “Puzzling, ridiculous, and oddly irresistible, [the runaway trolley] scenario has profoundly shaped our understanding of right and wrong. In the past 40 years it has occupied the attention of brilliant minds, from academic ethicists to moral psychologists to engineers. It has helped them try to answer profound questions—how do we act, and how should we? But in its fifth decade, is the trolley problem starting to show its age?”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
3. Empathy Machine
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, technology, ethics, the arts
KQs: What role does empathy play in knowledge acquisition about the world?
Description: “Videogames are not only a way for an audience to experience a life outside their own, but also a powerful way for a person to invite others into one's own personal history and perspective, to not only view the story from the sidelines, but from the inside.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: Wired
4. Hip language
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences
KQs: Is meaning hard-wired to words?
Description: “Hipsters are famous for their love of all things old-fashioned: 19th Century beards, pickle-making, Amish outerwear, naming their kids Clementine or Atticus. Now, they may be excavating archaic language, too. As Chi Luu points out at JSTOR Daily — the blog of a database of academic journals, what could be more hipster than that? — old-timey words like bespoke, peruse, smitten and dapper appear to be creeping back into the lexicon.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: Independent/Washington Post
5. Motivation and insight
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, human sciences, intuition
KQs: Is curiosity a prerequisite of knowledge acquisition?
Description: “People who are concrete thinkers aren't going to come up with the insights. People who are speculative, who engage in hypothetical as opposed to concrete reasoning, they're the ones that are likely to generate insights -- that's the personality difference. Curiosity is something that I've been wondering about recently, because curiosity seems to be one of the primary engines for insight.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: Wired
6. Selfish memory
AoKs/WoKs: Memory, human sciences, technology
KQs: What habits in the present ensure the retention of knowledge from the past?
Description: “Digital cameras remove us from the present. And afterwards, when we review the thousands of photos we’ve taken, they are just another thousand photos. They aren’t special. Instead of Mary reviewing dozens of photos that captured major parts of her life, imagine she had thousands. They would be meaningless. And the chances of her recalling anything related to those precious times in her life would be near zero. Capturing a colossal number of photos of any event is indirectly proportional to your ability recall the event later on. It cheapens it because you didn’t live the moment; you were too busy documenting it.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: Big Think
7. Issues of mortality
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, ethics, emotion
KQs: To what extent do people employ reason, rather than emotion, to form a position on issues such as the death penalty and abortion?
Description: “In Indiana, a woman who suffered a miscarriage and delivered a stillborn fetus was charged and convicted of both “feticide” and “felony neglect of a dependent”—despite the fact that the first crime requires terminating a pregnancy while the fetus is still in the womb while the latter requires delivering a live baby and then neglecting it. Logic doesn’t seem to matter when the state is trying to protect women’s bodies from their owners.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: The Atlantic
8. Artificial emotional intelligence
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, technology, human sciences
KQs: Do we need help in making decisions involving emotional intelligence?
Description: “We need AEI rather badly because our emotional frailties dwarf our incapacities in raw mathematics or data management: we make extremely poor decisions about how we should manage relationships. We have little idea what job to focus on and when to quit. We don't know what to spend our money on. We get holidays wrong, have no clue how to repair friendships or handle tricky employees, and fumble as to how to reconcile with our parents.”
Discussion points, further exploration, and extra KQ consideration: See the premium newsletter!
Source: Wired
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
7 more detailed real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
- To what extent is history an interdisciplinary field?
- Is compassion the most vital component of ethical decision making?
- How and why do ethical outlooks change over time?
- Are scientifically measurable processes the sole reason for the efficacy of medicines?
- Does the subjectivity of human sciences and history make knowledge acquisition more difficult?
- To what extent are ethical principles merely linguistic constructs?
- To what extent do societal values shape religious outlooks?
... and 5 ‘quick’ real life situations, helping you to consider:
- Is morality relative or absolute?
- What are the philosophical problems with travelling back in time and killing Hitler?
- What role does creativity play in solving human science problems?
- How many senses are there?
- What does poetry look like?
UPGRADE TO THE PREMIUM NEWSLETTER
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Download our new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The TOK Sessions Pack
The awesome TOK Sessions pack is now being used by hundreds of educators around the world to deliver the TOK course, and help students understand the assessment tasks.
The pack contains 85 lesson plans for all the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing, introductory lessons on TOK, plenary sessions for the end of the course, and suggestions on how to explain the essay and presentation.
Purchase the TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companions
Our inspirational TED Companion Packs present TOK-related questions on a total of 100 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, form a position on contemporary knowledge debates, and place TOK concepts and ideas in an academic and social context.
The packs include a guide for teachers, student handouts, and a breakdown of each talk, allowing your students to engage with them either in or out of the classroom.
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Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2015 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
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We are the world's most popular online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the September edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
Welcome to the September edition of the TOK newsletter. We've been developing quite a few new ideas and resources for TOK, and you can access some of them for free.
Our first video made in conjunction with Cambridge University Press has been released, and can be seen on YouTube. It introduces knowledge questions and real life situations, explaining their significance to TOK, and how to approach them in the essay and presentation. We’ll be releasing more over the next few months, covering many different aspects of the course.
We're also planning to release a whole range of exciting new TOK resources for the 2015-16 academic year, and these can be viewed in our resources brochure. These include an additional Sessions Pack, a second TED Companion, and an all new resource making the ideas and thoughts of philosophers more TOK-friendly.
If you’d like to introduce or consolidate TOK skills in your school, orwant to consider the 'bigger picture' of what we're doing, in a clear, engaging, and jargon-free way, our new student seminars and teacher workshops will be of interest to you. See the different topics and modules that we deliver here.
Our app for both iOS and Android is available by following the links below.
News stories & knowledge questions
1. Tabloid knowledge
We present the first of our RLSs in the same way it appears in the premium newsletter. Find out more details on subscriptionshere.
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences (journalism), emotion, reason, nature of knowledge
First order KQs: What characterises tabloid journalism?
Second order KQs: What the knowledge implications of news being reported in a contradictory way? Which ways of knowing are necessary to read between tabloid lines? What impact does a biased agenda have in terms of the reporting of ‘the truth’?
Description: “British tabloids, which have been scaremongering about refugees for years, telling Britons to fear and resist any immigration and helping to drive the UK's shameful anti-refugee policies, discovered their compassion for refugees on Wednesday when a small child's body washed up on a Turkish shore. The child was a Syrian refugee who, like many hundreds of other refugees, had died during the dangerous journey across the Mediterranean. A photo of the young boy went viral, and the same British tabloids that are overtly hostile to living refugees decided that this one was worth caring about, and have plastered their covers with his image.”
Discussion points: This is a great story for viewing the way in which tabloid journalism works (and, some would say, journalism in general). Driven by motives other than simply conveying the ‘truth’ about what is going on in the world, one finds completely different headlines and and reports of exactly the same events and issues going on in the world. Given the very high circulation figures of these papers, the knowledge implications of this are huge: most people who read a newspaper (either online, or printed) read a tabloid newspaper, so their knowledge of what is going on in the world is based on this approach to covering contemporary events. Does this mean that most people’s knowledge of the world is flawed? Do other sources of knowledge make up for this? Are serious (or ‘broadsheet’) newspapers and news sites better, or do they just market themselves more convincingly?
Further exploration: There’s a great deal of scope for further exploration here. Look at different tabloid news sites, and try to get a handle on their agenda. How does this affect the way they communicate knowledge? Should more to be done to try to force tabloids to approach journalism in a more accurate way?
Source: Vox
2. Importance of smell
AoKs/WoKs: Sense perception, emotion, human sciences (psychology)
KQs: Why do we underrate the importance of knowledge provided to us by our olfactory sense?
Description: “Despite the various ways smell protects us, humans often count it as one of the senses they could do without. (In arecent study by McCann Worldgroup, “53 percent of those aged 16-22 and 48 percent of those aged 23-30 would give up their own sense of smell if it meant they could keep an item of technology.”) For me, too, it was a sense I thought I could do without—until I lost it.”
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: The Atlantic
3. Divisive words
AoKs/WoKs: Language, ethics
KQs: What does language reveal about our personal biases?
Description: “The split goes so deep that the two sides can't even agree on what the people entering Europe should be called. To those who view them sympathetically, they're refugees; to those who want them kept out, they're migrants. So which side is right? The answer's complicated."
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: Vox
4. Contemporary theories
AoKs/WoKs: Language, emotion, human sciences (psychology)
KQs: Does language interfere with our ability to communicate our emotions?
Description: “One way of understanding the enthusiasm for telepathy is to consider its inverse: the growing suspicion of traditional verbal communication. Consider the remarkable rise of emoji, which, according to one British linguistics expert, is “the fastest growing form of language in history, based on its incredible adoption rate and speed of evolution.”
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: The Atlantic
5. Impeded by words
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences, technology
KQs: Can a link between violence and video games be proven?
Description: “Psychologists have confirmed that playing violent video games is linked to aggressive and callous behaviour. A review of almost a decade of studies found that exposure to violent video games was a "risk factor" for increased aggression."
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: The Independent
6. Moved by music
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, indigenous knowledge systems, human sciences (anthropology and sociology), memory
KQs: Does music help us to interpret and understand emotional knowledge?
Description: “If you think you’re obsessed with music, consider the BaBinga people from Central Africa, who have elaborate dances for almost every activity, from gathering honey to hunting for elephants. The anthropologist Gilbert Rouget, who lived with them in 1946, found that sleeping through the ceremonies was considered one of the greatest crimes.”
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: BBC
7. Messy science
AoKs/WoKs: Natural and human sciences, mathematics
KQs: Can scientific data be used to prove anything?
Description: “If we’re going to rely on science as a means for reaching the truth — and it’s still the best tool we have — it’s important that we understand and respect just how difficult it is to get a rigorous result. I could pontificate about all the reasons why science is arduous, but instead I’m going to let you experience one of them for yourself.”
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: FiveThirtyEight
8. Images that change the world
AoKs/WoKs: Human sciences (journalism and psychology), the arts, ethics
KQs: Why does the knowledge provided by an image impact more on us than text?
Description: “By now, you've probably seen the photo. A lifeless boy, body limp and legs dangling, is carried by a Turkish paramilitary officer from the water's edge. The image is a powerful representation of the refugee crisis in and around the Mediterranean. Taken by photographer-reporter Nilufer Demir, the photograph sped quickly around the world in mass media and on social networks, sparking increased outrage with every post and retweet. Photographs like this stay with you, as unshakable as a bad childhood memory.”
Discussion points & further exploration: Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
Source: Vice News
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
7 more detailed real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
- Should science be removed from the context of everyday life in order to understand it?
- To what extent is our perception of indigenous people shaped by biases?
- How is ‘indisputable’ proof established in history?
- To what extent is scientific knowledge open to debate?
- How do medical myths become accepted as ‘fact’?
- Is reflective thinking always more effective than intuitive thinking?
- Is reason built on mathematics and science?
5 ‘quick’ real life situations, helping you to consider:
- What role does environment play in the development of language?
- Why do languages die - and what are the consequences?
- What does it mean to be religious?
- What does our slang say about our identity?
- Do we 'perceive the world inaccurately all the time'?
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly. Downloadour new resources brochure for 2015-16.
The TOK Sessions Pack
The awesome TOK Sessions pack is now being used by hundreds of educators around the world to deliver the TOK course, and help students understand the assessment tasks.
The pack contains 85 lesson plans for all the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing, introductory lessons on TOK, plenary sessions for the end of the course, and suggestions on how to explain the essay and presentation.
Purchase the TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion Pack
The inspirational TED Companion Pack presents TOK-related questions on 60 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, be involved in the most important contemporary knowledge issues, and gather material for their essays and presentations.
16 Essential speakers are identified, and advice is provided for including the key ideas of the talks into essay and presentations.
Purchase the TED Companion Pack
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2015 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
theoryofknowledge.net
12 Magrath Avenue
Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
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We are the world's most used online resource for the theory of knowledge course
Our teaching and learning resourceseducate rather than inculcate IB Diploma students
Welcome to the May edition of the theoryofknowledge.net free newsletter.
We've been working to improve the theoryofknowledge.net app, so if you haven't already downloaded it, click on the buttons below to take you to either the Apple Store, or Google Play, depending on your device. We are now sending out RLSs and KQs as push notifications, so make sure this is activated on the app.
We'll also be announcing an exciting joint venture with Cambridge University Press very soon, so although many students around the world are coming to the end of their TOK journey, we'll be continuing to help educators prepare for the start of the 2016 academic year.
News stories & knowledge questions
As always, we present the unpacked version of our first RLS.Premium subscribers to the newsletter receive all the stories presented in this way, plus ten extra stories, a focus on an area of knowledge or way of knowing, tips on the essay and presentation, and an embedded video about a key thinker. The premium newsletter also distinguishes between first and second order knowledge questions.
Also available is the TOK teaching pack. This includes a subscription to the premium newsletter, as well as copies of the essay and presentation guides, and a discount voucher that you can use to purchase further theoryofknowledge.net resources. Find out more about this innovative resourcehere.
Upgrade to the Premium Newsletter
1. Journalistic perspectives
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, human sciences
First order KQs: Why have relations between the US police and ordinary citizens declined over the last year?
Second order KQs: Do nationalist and cultural biases affect the way the news is reported? What are the ethical implications of non-objective journalism?
Description: “If what is happening in Baltimore happened in a foreign country, here is how Western media would cover it:International leaders expressed concern over the rising tide of racism and state violence in America, especially concerning the treatment of ethnic minorities in the country and the corruption in state security forces around the country when handling cases of police brutality. The latest crisis is taking place in Baltimore, Maryland, a once-bustling city on the country’s Eastern Seaboard, where an unarmed man named Freddie Gray died from a severed spine while in police custody….”
Considering different perspectives: This article is built around a consideration of different perspectives. It is written as though it is about an issue affecting a foreign country, rather than the USA, and the result is that it is far more critical than it might have been otherwise. This leads us to consider the role of nationality when it comes to understanding political and social issues in the world, and the way our personal and social biases affect this understanding.
What are the implications of this RLS? Most of us are willing to accept that our knowledge about the world is inevitably biased, based on our upbringing, outlook on life, nationality, and so on. But quite how far that is the case is often difficult to accept. Do we judge other cultures and people differently to the way we judge our own? This article demonstrates that that difference is a lot more pronounced than we might have thought or believed. It also raises many questions about how the news is reported, and how foreign issues are treated differently to domestic ones.
Source: Washington Post
2. Political symbols
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, sense perception, emotion, history
KQs: To what extent do we recognise the connotations of a symbol instinctively?
Description: “Hillary Clinton’s new logo, [is] a blue and red “H” with a bold arrow as the crossbar. Since anything to do with Hillary raises red (and blue) flags, critics assumed that the logo must be packed with symbolism. So, left-wingers were displeased that the arrow is red and points to the right, while right-wingers were annoyed that, when reversed, the arrow points left. Not since the Soviets ideologically censored art for geographical orientation—things facing West were forbidden—has the mere direction of anything been so disparaged.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Atlantic
3. World languages
AoKs/WoKs: Language, human sciences, indigenous knowledge systems
KQs: Is language and identity analogous?
Description: “These seven maps and charts, visualized by The Washington Post, will help you understand how diverse other parts of the world are in terms of languages. Not all continents are equally diverse in the number of spoken languages. Whereas Asia leads the statistics with 2,301 languages, Africa follows closely with 2,138. There are about 1,300 languages in the Pacific, and 1,064 in South and North America. Europe, despite its many nation-states, is at the bottom of the pack with just 286.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: Washington Post
4. Music revolutions
AoKs/WoKs: The arts, natural sciences, reason
KQs: Can we use scientific methods to understand the arts?
Description: “The evolution of western pop music, spanning from 1960 to 2010, has been analysed by scientists. A team from Queen Mary University of London and Imperial College London looked at more than 17,000 songs from the US Billboard Hot 100. They found three music revolutions - in 1964, 1983 and 1991 - and traced the loss of blues chords from the charts, as well as the birth of disco. The study is published in the Royal Society Open Science journal. The team also refuted claims that pop music is starting to sound the same.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: BBC
5. Rules of art
AoKs/WoKs: Mathematics, the arts
KQs: Is beauty an objective concept?
Description: “Revered as the formula that defines beauty, the golden ratio is a mathematically derived principle claimed by many to be embodied in objects as diverse as a spiralled seashell and the Parthenon. But the widespread belief that the golden ratio is the natural blueprint for beauty is pseudo-scientific “hocus-pocus” and a “myth that refuses to go away”, according to leading mathematicians.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
6. Heart versus head
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, reason, human sciences
KQs: Is it unethical for politicians to appeal to our emotions rather than reason?
Description: “The sensible way, surely, to come to a decision is read the party manifestos and assess the policies? Failing that, there's a plentiful supply of election news as well as websites promising to match your values with what the parties are offering. But, as psychologists like to remind us, we're not rational beings. Setting aside individuals who earn a living listening to politicians (mainly journalists and economists at the Institute for Fiscal Studies), most people probably don't read manifestos or carefully digest the Today programme's interviews with politicians. Of course, many people keep across the news - but how many of us could recite each party's position on eliminating the deficit?”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: BBC
7. Learning morality
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics, human sciences
KQs: Is ethical awareness innate?
Description: “[Dr Laura] Warren’s belief is that children, like all of us, are psychologically tribal, and that those primeval instincts remain overwhelmingly powerful. “We have too much of a rosy, skewed, unhelpful picture of kids in this country,” she says. As in, we see them all as angelic and beautiful? “Absolutely. But they’re real. They’re mini adults.” And that means they’re machiavellian. “We all want to get the most out of a situation for ourselves,” she says. “That’s a human trait. That’s basic Darwinian survival.” Warren is trying to exploit children’s desire to earn treats and tribal status by connecting such rewards to their behaviour. “There’s competing in the tribe and cooperating in it. I try to balance those instincts.””
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
8. Emotions of flies
AoKs/WoKs: Emotion, natural sciences
KQs: To what extent is emotion a universal concept?
Description: “Insects and other animals might be able to feel fear similar to the way humans do, say scientists, after a study that could one day teach us about our own emotions. To find out whether flies are able to feel emotion, researchers broke down feelings into their smallest blocks, and then tried to find ways of studying whether the flies were exhibiting those behaviours.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Independent
9. The right to incite hatred
AoKs/WoKs: Ethics
KQs: To what extent is xenophobia or religious animosity based on an ignorance of other cultures?
Description: “The co-founder of the group behind the contest to award $10,000 for the best cartoon depiction of Muhammad is a New Yorker who runs a blog that campaigns to stop the “Islamification” of America. Pamela Geller used her blog Atlas Shrugs to declare “this is war” in the hours after the shooting of two gunmen at the contest. The event had been organised by the American Freedom Defense Initiative, a group she set up with Robert Spencer in 2010. Geller, the winner of numerous awards from far-right organisations such as the David Horowitz Freedom Center, is credited with coining the term “ground zero mega mosque” as part of highly publicised campaign against the development of a community centre, which included a mosque, a few blocks from where the twin towers once stood in New York.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Guardian
10. Shampoo and pseudoscience
AoKs/WoKs: Reason, language, natural sciences, ethics
KQs: Where is the line between spurious and genuine scientific claims?
Description: “Given the existence of the BIEB [‘beauty-industry efficacy bias’], we should always bring a furiously critical eye to the assessment of any claim made by Big Beauty. Phrases such as “clinically proven” or “dermatologist approved” have little meaning because they could refer to almost anything. For example, what kind of study led to the representation that a given product was clinically proven? Did the manufacturers simply ask a couple of buyers? Do not be fooled by this kind of language, particularly when the presence of the BIEB makes critical analysis of the claims unlikely.”
For different perspectives, implications, and more KQs: See the premium newsletter.
Source: The Atlantic
What else comes in this month's premium newsletter?
5 more unpacked real life situations, exploring the following knowledge questions:
- How can language be used to give meaning to an empty concept?
- Does popular science help or hinder the production of scientific knowledge?
- Can remembering cause forgetting?
- When can our imagination be debilitating to our knowledge acquisition?
- Can we ever truly know another person?
...and 5 'quick' RLSs, looking at:
- What is the relationship between our appearance and our behaviour?
- Why do we enjoy being angry?
- To what extent is time a subjective concept?
- Who should have autonomy over our genetic legacy?
- Is science ‘broken’?
We also focus on the arts, identifying central terms and ideas that you need to grasp, including a video talk by a key thinker, and quotes for you to consider.
Finally, we think about structuring the importance of writing a TOK journal.
Upgrade now to receive all this, and more!
Our TOK teaching and learning resources
theoryofknowledge.net is now the one-stop destination for all TOK educators and learners. All our resources can be purchased securely from the site, and are emailed to you instantly.
The TOK Sessions Pack
The awesome TOK Sessions pack is now being used by hundreds of educators around the world to deliver the TOK course, and help students understand the assessment tasks.
The pack contains 85 lesson plans for all the areas of knowledge and ways of knowing, introductory lessons on TOK, plenary sessions for the end of the course, and suggestions on how to explain the essay and presentation.
Purchase the TOK Sessions Pack
TED Companion Pack
The inspirational TED Companion Pack presents TOK-related questions on 60 different TED talks, enabling students to learn about key thinkers and ideas, be involved in the most important contemporary knowledge issues, and gather material for their essays and presentations.
16 Essential speakers are identified, and advice is provided for including the key ideas of the talks into essay and presentations.
Purchase the TED Companion Pack
Browse all our brilliant resources for TOK
theoryofknowledge.net has a diverse range of teaching and learning resources that will help you to master the course, understand the key ideas, and write the perfect essay or presentation. Check out our resources shop here.
Copyright © 2015 theoryofknowledge.net, All rights reserved.
You have either subscribed via the theoryofknowledge.net site, purchased one of our resources, or are involved with the wonderful world of TOK.
Our mailing address is:
theoryofknowledge.net
12 Magrath Avenue
Cambridge, CB4 3AH
United Kingdom
Add us to your address book
Day 4: TOK Essay intro
The task is a 1200-1600 word essay on the student’s choice of one of 6 available prompts. Class of 2018 prompts won’t be released until September 1. The Day 1 email contained the 6 prompts used in May2017 and you can look to other older prompts in the below link. Our school’s average score remains typically under 5 out of 10 mostly because papers are satisfactory/basic but not particularly lively/revealing/memorable/persuasive in the real-world evidence they use to support their claims. This evidence primarily needs to be come from your subject specific classes.
As you will see in sample papers in the coming days, students need to own/understand the unexpected/revealing RLSs/case studies/evidence they use to support their argumentative claims emerging from the prompt they select. This evidence may come from specific stories/incidents tied to major/historical figures in your academic area but it just as easily can come from contemporary examples, personal examples (in a dance performance, in their early science fair experiments, etc) or may come from major quotations. IB seems to like specific references to experiments, publications, court cases. IB also seems to encourage use of global examples (indigenous peoples, historical examples that aren’t all Euro-centric). It is in suggestion of these things where we need your help. Please look into your subject area for conflicting models, debates amongst experts in their field, paradigm shifters, major overthrows of methodologies, how new terminology in your field emerged (naming, scope, applications, historical developments) and bring them forth whenever possible in discussion. Our school seems weakest in their ability to actually know/name specific historians and be able to discuss/explore their biases, research methodologies, implications of their findings/processes. IB hates overused examples like Guernica, Hitler, Copernicus, Euclid, Andy Warhol, etc. The ATTTACHED PDF included in this email show the IB list of overused examples ON PG 7-9… many of which are actually pretty impressive but just go to show how distinctive, perceptive, unique they want the examples/evidence used to be.
MUST READ THE ATTACHED PDF PG 7-9 FOR EXAMPLES OF OVERUSED EXAMPLES (to get a sense of the benchmark we need to surpass as a school)
Main info (LOOK to the 10 pt rubric (look to the descriptors in the bottom left for scores of 7 or better) & The main question of assessors right below the rubric. http://schstok.weebly.com/tok-essay-info.html
Past years of TOK Essay prompts (good examples of KQs): https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8Tm1JQThvdFlVcDQ
The task is a 1200-1600 word essay on the student’s choice of one of 6 available prompts. Class of 2018 prompts won’t be released until September 1. The Day 1 email contained the 6 prompts used in May2017 and you can look to other older prompts in the below link. Our school’s average score remains typically under 5 out of 10 mostly because papers are satisfactory/basic but not particularly lively/revealing/memorable/persuasive in the real-world evidence they use to support their claims. This evidence primarily needs to be come from your subject specific classes.
As you will see in sample papers in the coming days, students need to own/understand the unexpected/revealing RLSs/case studies/evidence they use to support their argumentative claims emerging from the prompt they select. This evidence may come from specific stories/incidents tied to major/historical figures in your academic area but it just as easily can come from contemporary examples, personal examples (in a dance performance, in their early science fair experiments, etc) or may come from major quotations. IB seems to like specific references to experiments, publications, court cases. IB also seems to encourage use of global examples (indigenous peoples, historical examples that aren’t all Euro-centric). It is in suggestion of these things where we need your help. Please look into your subject area for conflicting models, debates amongst experts in their field, paradigm shifters, major overthrows of methodologies, how new terminology in your field emerged (naming, scope, applications, historical developments) and bring them forth whenever possible in discussion. Our school seems weakest in their ability to actually know/name specific historians and be able to discuss/explore their biases, research methodologies, implications of their findings/processes. IB hates overused examples like Guernica, Hitler, Copernicus, Euclid, Andy Warhol, etc. The ATTTACHED PDF included in this email show the IB list of overused examples ON PG 7-9… many of which are actually pretty impressive but just go to show how distinctive, perceptive, unique they want the examples/evidence used to be.
MUST READ THE ATTACHED PDF PG 7-9 FOR EXAMPLES OF OVERUSED EXAMPLES (to get a sense of the benchmark we need to surpass as a school)
Main info (LOOK to the 10 pt rubric (look to the descriptors in the bottom left for scores of 7 or better) & The main question of assessors right below the rubric. http://schstok.weebly.com/tok-essay-info.html
Past years of TOK Essay prompts (good examples of KQs): https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8Tm1JQThvdFlVcDQ
DAY 5
Read/explore as many sample TOK essays as possible for the differences between good & bad papers as well as the way they use paragraphs/examples & the range of their arguments/insights on the prompts & the voice/style/pacing (quantity/depth arrived at with individual RLSs/examples) used in writing & how many cited sources they use. Students can cite TED videos, documentaries, books, JSTOR articles, their own work in IB (EE, CAS, Group 4, etc). Suggest as many citable sources/evidence in your classes as possible and how they might be useful for a TOK essay prompt (once we know the prompts in September) or at least in how those examples show a hunt/acquisition of knowledge, how your field operationalizes a concept, a revision to knowledge, a knowledge debate, an ethical concern in pursuit of knowledge, issues tied to biases, limitations, uncertainties, benefits of knowledge etc.
Your simple task could be to see the full range of scores on the 10 point rubric (see the rubric at http://schstok.weebly.com/tok-essay-info.html ) via
Samples of a 2, 4, 7, 9 score points: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8QlZGTjhhYlcxbjg
But consider exploring these as well:
IB released samples from May 2016 or 2017: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8TmxZSGZLY1FtNUU
IB released essay scored samples under the current rubric: https://ibpublishing.ibo.org/server2/rest/app/tsm.xql?doc=d_0_tokxx_tsm_1305_1_e&part=5&chapter=2
May 2015 training samples with scores: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8X2xmZ0FyMGxqSzg
High scoring Creek papers of recent years: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8LWxzUGlST1E1MDA
Bad papers that scored 1 out of 10: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8bnNDLTJTLUY3QmM
The 2002 teacher support material PDF in this folder also shows the gap between a good paper (Essay 1) and a horrible paper (Essay 6): https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8c1VLbllpYnNkOVE
FYI on the way in which IB unpacks a prompt or essay title and their expectations with it:https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8dzZQdEk1Z0k3Znc
OR
In Day 6 we will ask you to score blindly as an examiner would at least 3 papers (submit scores via Google Form) and we will discuss your results versus their actual scores in the next IB faculty mtg or over email.
Read/explore as many sample TOK essays as possible for the differences between good & bad papers as well as the way they use paragraphs/examples & the range of their arguments/insights on the prompts & the voice/style/pacing (quantity/depth arrived at with individual RLSs/examples) used in writing & how many cited sources they use. Students can cite TED videos, documentaries, books, JSTOR articles, their own work in IB (EE, CAS, Group 4, etc). Suggest as many citable sources/evidence in your classes as possible and how they might be useful for a TOK essay prompt (once we know the prompts in September) or at least in how those examples show a hunt/acquisition of knowledge, how your field operationalizes a concept, a revision to knowledge, a knowledge debate, an ethical concern in pursuit of knowledge, issues tied to biases, limitations, uncertainties, benefits of knowledge etc.
Your simple task could be to see the full range of scores on the 10 point rubric (see the rubric at http://schstok.weebly.com/tok-essay-info.html ) via
Samples of a 2, 4, 7, 9 score points: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8QlZGTjhhYlcxbjg
But consider exploring these as well:
IB released samples from May 2016 or 2017: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8TmxZSGZLY1FtNUU
IB released essay scored samples under the current rubric: https://ibpublishing.ibo.org/server2/rest/app/tsm.xql?doc=d_0_tokxx_tsm_1305_1_e&part=5&chapter=2
May 2015 training samples with scores: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8X2xmZ0FyMGxqSzg
High scoring Creek papers of recent years: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8LWxzUGlST1E1MDA
Bad papers that scored 1 out of 10: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8bnNDLTJTLUY3QmM
The 2002 teacher support material PDF in this folder also shows the gap between a good paper (Essay 1) and a horrible paper (Essay 6): https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8c1VLbllpYnNkOVE
FYI on the way in which IB unpacks a prompt or essay title and their expectations with it:https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B04AA4i4sOu8dzZQdEk1Z0k3Znc
OR
In Day 6 we will ask you to score blindly as an examiner would at least 3 papers (submit scores via Google Form) and we will discuss your results versus their actual scores in the next IB faculty mtg or over email.
Day 6:
YOUR TASK = Please score the 3 attached TOK essays using the rubric in the below link. Enter your scores via Google Form here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfBcS-IeU_I6rtFen6aUnvBdYKn4PxFZA0qHa4FUCj_Pz0VQw/viewform?usp=sf_link
We will be in touch with actual scores/discussions once everyone has submitted scores. I would assume this task is required for everyone in the “TO” line but optional for everyone in the CC line.
The 10 point rubric (needed for scoring) can be seen at http://schstok.weebly.com/tok-essay-info.html
Email me with any questions or other FYIs (suggested books/movies/quotes/articles/etc).
YOUR TASK = Please score the 3 attached TOK essays using the rubric in the below link. Enter your scores via Google Form here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfBcS-IeU_I6rtFen6aUnvBdYKn4PxFZA0qHa4FUCj_Pz0VQw/viewform?usp=sf_link
We will be in touch with actual scores/discussions once everyone has submitted scores. I would assume this task is required for everyone in the “TO” line but optional for everyone in the CC line.
The 10 point rubric (needed for scoring) can be seen at http://schstok.weebly.com/tok-essay-info.html
Email me with any questions or other FYIs (suggested books/movies/quotes/articles/etc).
tok_essay_sample_a.pdf | |
File Size: | 631 kb |
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tok_essay_sample_b.pdf | |
File Size: | 522 kb |
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tok_essay_sample_c.pdf | |
File Size: | 632 kb |
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