TOK Essay land - August to February, reflections

This year's journey with the essay component of the TOK course we co-taught was rather remarkable - in part due to the opportunity to engage with students in a classroom setting, and largely in part to the assigned topics/prescribed titles themselves. 

In a nutshell, the group of 6 titles that are customarily assigned to students sitting exams in a May session proved really conducive to having productive in-class discussions, around approaches to the central knowledge issue question itself, in each. For example, our Math-minded students took delight in having a chance to write a fully formed essay in a non-Math discipline that gets to the heart of the matter about the role of mathematics in human culture. By the same token, our Arts-appreciative students thrilled at the prospect of bouncing off ideas in regards to the role of interpretation in artistic endeavors. And of course, there were the more "cryptic" titles, so to speak, in true TOK fashion - partnered with TOK infused terminology and a fancy quote (wink wink truth and facts). 

On the whole, students felt they understood the assignment, did not fear it, and were able to meet the key deadlines (the majority). Hence, in true DP fashion - in a reflection portion of this exercise, what we learnt was that good planning pays off; TOKatives helped immensely, particularly when dealing with real-life examples, and in-class writing/drafting time was a godsent. 

And come August 2022, here we go again :-)