Welcome, ToK students

I hope you spent an enjoyable summer break (consider 'rating' it for us, if you have yet to, by completing the survey question below) and are starting to find your feet as a Senior School student at KGV.

As you will know by now, Theory of Knowledge (ToK) is an interactive course whose success rests on the willingness of its participants:

• to think and to question;
• to share their thinking and questions; and
• to engage the thinking and questions of others.

With this in mind, all Year 12 students enrolled in the IB and ESF Advanced Diploma have been invited to interact on-line, via their assigned Sophie's World blog, before starting the classroom portion of ToK the week of 1 October. In this Pre-ToK work, students will be expected every week:

1. to read a section of Sophie's World;
2. to think about it and the assignment prompt;
3. to blog their response on-line;
4. to read the contributions of others; and
5. to post a second response to others' reactions.

Because I want to emphasise dialogue and interaction, I have divided the novel into four manageable sections to be read and responded to over four weeks starting the week of 3 September. Discussion prompts will be posted weekly, usually on the Friday of the week preceding the assignment period. See the assignment schedule (.pdf) for details.

In the final week of this Pre-ToK work, students will be expected to attend ONE after-school screening of the movie version of Sophie's World -- the inaugural BYOP: Bring Your Own Popcorn. It will be shown in the Peel Block Lecture Theatre on Tuesday (2/10), Wednesday (3/10), and Thursday (4/10) from 3:30-5:30pm. Pick a date, bring a date... and don't forget the popcorn. The fifth and final Pre-ToK assignment will be based on the movie.

ASSESSMENT

For this on-line portion of the ToK course, students will be evaluated on the basis of their on-line responses to the readings. As mentioned above, everyone will be expected to react to the prompts and post two responses. The first will be a considered response to that week's prompt of between 100 and 400 words. This is your chance to communicate in writing your personal viewpoint and learning as they relate specifically to the ideas and values in the assigned section from the novel. A good first response will:

1. artfully make a connection between the subject at hand and your own experience;
2. have a clear introduction and conclusion; and
3. develop its main body by making reference to specific points or passages to directly address the prompt.

The second response to others' reactions should follow these same guidelines for length, although they may well be shorter. See the assessment rubric (.pdf) for details.

By the third ToK class (week of 29 October), students will be expected to have printed-out and pasted hard-copies of their five on-line posts in their ToK notebook, as well as one of their follow-up posts to others' responses that they consider most interesting.

Enough from me for now.