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Examples to use in ToK essays


SirStephen

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I'm writing my ToK essay, and my teacher has advised me to include personal examples, and reference it to personal experiences. The problem is that for my title I can think of both personal examples and ones from my lessons. Would it be better to include a personal example or one from my lesson (assuming they are of the same relevance and equally suited to the purpose).

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You need plenty of examples all throughout your TOK essay to back up everything that you're saying with a bit of evidence to illustrate your point, so I'd put in a personal example (as they're more difficult to come up with) but also remember to put in other examples such as the ones from your lesson. Basically put in examples where necessary and make it a mix of both. Generally people struggle most with coming up with personal examples, so you're at least on the more fortunate side of things! :P

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I'm writing my ToK essay, and my teacher has advised me to include personal examples, and reference it to personal experiences. The problem is that for my title I can think of both personal examples and ones from my lessons. Would it be better to include a personal example or one from my lesson (assuming they are of the same relevance and equally suited to the purpose).

The whole purpose of TOK is to enhance your overall knowledge, your global knowledge you can say. By doing this, we use the Areas of knowing and the Ways of knowing. We soon can discover truth and reality. I'm sure you know this.

Your TOK essay shouldn't be just research and all theoretical. They want to see how YOU are able to come closer to knowledge through the different areas of knowing or the ways of knowing. Personal examples should demonstrate your own personal experience that helped you deepen your overall knowledge.

For example, If I wanted to explain language as a way of knowing, I can use a word we learned in french class that cannot be translated directly in another language. I can then explain how this example shows the limitations of language in our search for knowledge. Personal examples can be anything from school related to family related. The choices are unlimmited, as long as they are applicable/demonstrate/prove what you are trying to say.

Perhaps the reason why they do not want any experiences from your childhood is that you would be talking about the distant past, something that is no longer relevent to the present day society, something that is not happening NOW in your discovery of knowledge. Perhaps at that young age, you were not capable of understanding harder aspects such as truth, reality, perception etc.

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