AREAS OF KNOWLEDGE
The Areas of Knowledge are highly organized aggregates of Shared Knowledge characterized by distinct subject matter and methods of inquiry. Areas of Knowledge are socially constructed and incorporate the Ways of Knowing in various nuanced combinations.
The individual Areas of Knowledge have endured and have evolved. They have commonalities and differences which are important to pinpoint including: specialized insider vocabulary, underlying assumptions and persistent open questions or frontiers.
From the TOK perspective the Areas of Knowledge encompass not only the Academic Disciplines but also Religious and Indigenous Knowledge Systems.
AREAS OF KNOWLEDGE FRAMEWORK:
1. Scope/Applications
2. Concepts/Language
3. Methodology
4. Historical development
5. Links to Personal Knowledge
YEAR ONE
1. NATURAL SCIENCES
Is there a scientific method?
Nature: an encounter with a real science journal
2. HISTORY
Draw history (including cubist history)
History is not what happened
3. MATHEMATICS
Proof
The special case of mathematical induction
Chess algorithm
This Statement is False
Platonists vs. Formalists written assignment
4. THE ARTS
Non-linguistic forms of representation: Shostakovich 8th string quartet
Picasso’s lie and Coleridge's willing suspension of disbelief
Rembrandt self portraits
Duchamp's Fountain and Cage's 4'33''
The value of art
YEAR TWO
5. INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE SYSTEMS
Defining “indigenous”
Nacirema case study
What can we learn from traditional societies?
Exorcising cultural relativism
Indigenous themed oral presentation
6. ETHICS
Are ethics and morality the same thing?
The seven deadly sins
Trolley Problems
Ethical frames
Vera Drake: saint or serial killer writing assignment
Asch and Milgram experiments
Burkini
Gorilla language and personhood
7. ReLIGIOUS KNOWLEDGE SYSTEMS
Introduction to the Variety of Religious Experience
A very persistent meme
Differentiating religion/religiosity from personal faith
Encounter with radical atheism
Zen TOK
8. HUMAN SCIENCES
Isaiah Berlin’s pluralism written assignment
Big five personality traits
The 10 most pressing world problems