On Wednesday (May 10) the grade 11 class had their first official DP presentation for TOK. For those of you who don’t know (grade 10s listen up!), TOK stands for Theory of Knowledge and is a mandatory class that you must take and pass to graduate from the Diploma Programme.

This week grade 11 got to showcase some of their amazing work for an audience and demonstrate what they have learnt!

The students chose some fascinating questions relating to the ways we, as humans, use and consume knowledge, as well as the factors that influence how and why we know what we know. That may sound sort of confusing (believe me it was at first…) but the grade 11s were able to explain their thinking with the use of three ‘objects’ that they chose in relation to their question and theme. Some of the ideas students explored were “How do our values affect what we know to be true?”, “How and to what extent does knowledge depend on experience?”, “How does knowledge rely on interactions?”, etc. They then explored these questions through the lens of the different themes they covered during their lessons, such as Knowledge & Politics, Knowledge & Language, and Knowledge & Religion.

Over the day various different classes flooded the chapel on the 10th floor to learn from the grade 11s, from grade 5 students making the trek from Nakatsu (they made me feel very old), to a few grade 12s popping up in between their exams to wish the juniors luck!

The final session took place in the evening when parents and teachers were able to come to watch some of the presentations and ask some insightful questions. One thing I found really interesting while watching other students give their presentations was just how creative they got with the medium they chose to present through. While some students used slideshows or handouts, others used poster boards or even had their objects with them to pass around to audience members!

All in all, I thought the evening and day was a success! Grade 11 students were able to interact with some younger kids and work on adapting their presentations for different age groups, while grade 9 and 10 students were able to get a quick preview of what they will be working on in their Diploma classes in the future.

A huge congratulations to all of the grade 11 students, and hopefully the next round of juniors will be just as great!