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How many prompts are given to base your exhibition on?
Thirty Five (35) IA prompts in the guide.
IA prompts change every year (True or False)
FALSE (35 prompts are fixed)
What main topics can I base the Exhibition on?
Core Theme & Optional Theme only
What do I submit to IB for my exhibition?
Your TOK exhibition commentary. This is a 950-word exploration of you chosen IA prompt.
Is a religious statue an object?
p.40 of the Guide, states that “they must be specific objects that have a specific real-world context—objects that exist in a particular time and place”. A generic “religious statue” image downloaded from the Internet only for the purpose of the IA task clearly lacks this context but....A statute you pay to, a statue you visited and took a picture of is specific
Is a photograph an object?
YES, if it has a specific real world context. e.g. iconic” photographs taken different photographers at different points in history.
Is a selfie, with the object, an object?
YES. An example is provided in the Guide of a student being present in a photograph: “A photograph of the student playing in an orchestra” (p.42). It may be that such an example was provided in order to include the very possibility of students appearing in photographs together with the object in question, and thus a “selfie”-style photograph of the student that includes the object in question would also fit this description.
Is a piece of music an object?
YES...BUT
the sheet music and/or lyric sheet, or a physical recording, perhaps even a photograph of a recital or concert, would certainly count as objects, in the strictest sense. BUT It would depend on three factors: firstly, what the other two objects were; secondly, what the chosen IA prompt is; and, thirdly, the theme guiding the analysis/interpretation/commentary.
Can I use an internet photo of an Object that I have interest in but cannot bring into the actual exhibition?
YES. A photograph of a museum exhibit, “such as a historical treaty, where it would not be practical/possible for them to exhibit the physical object” (IB Guide)
Is a screenshot of a video /film an object?
A “still” from a film seen/studied by the student would, in the same way as the “photograph of the student playing in an orchestra” (Guide, p.42), appear to broadly fit such a definition of an “object”. Again, contextualisation is all.
Can I make a painting or sculpture for the exhibition?
NO. p.42 of the Guide tells us that the objects chosen “may be objects that the student has created themselves, but they must be pre-existing objects rather than objects created specifically for the purposes of the exhibition”.
So you can use a piece from VA but not make one for TOK
Is a tattoo an object? / Is a vaccination an object?
Can be.....“Students are encouraged to choose objects that are of personal interest and that they have come across in their academic studies and/or their lives beyond the classroom” (Guide, p.41), and “The specific real-world context of each object is extremely important to the task. It is, therefore, important that students identify specific objects to discuss rather than using generic objects and generic images” (p.42).
until the first cohort of students has been examined and the moderators’ feedback and the Subject Report have been issued – and thus we have more feedback on questions such as this – is to encourage use of the types of objects exemplified in the Guide (p.42) and the samples provided in the Teacher Support Material.
All three objects should come out of one IA prompt. Can students make connections with more than one prompt?
No. As is made clear on p.40 of the Guide, “Students must select one of the following IA prompts on which to base their exhibition, and all three objects must be linked to the same prompt.”
What if a few students choose the same object or objects? Will that be allowed?
No. The Guide (p.39) makes this clear: “students in the same class are not permitted to use any of the same objects”.
Can the object be something the student has created individually? Or perhaps created as part of a group activity?
The Guide is clear that objects cannot be tailor-made specifically for the Exhibition: “They may be objects that the student has created themselves, but they must be pre-existing objects rather than objects created specifically for the purposes of the exhibition” (p.42). Thus, it may be a creation for a Visual Arts, or Design Technology class, or a model created for one of the Group 4 subjects or the Group 4 Project, or even something made as part of a CAS project. There is no problem provided that – as part of good academic honesty practice – the provenance is stated, that, if the object was made together with others their permission is given for it to be so used by only one of their number, and that credit is given where it is due.
Is it important that the three objects represent three distinctly different ways of responding to the prompt?
In a way YES
The assessment instrument for the IA task mentions two criteria (in the 9–10 mark band) which give us some insight into what this “unpacking” might look like. It says “Links between each of the three objects and the selected IA prompt are clearly made and well explained”, and “There is a strong justification of the particular contribution that each individual object makes to the exhibition” (Guide, p.47). As with any knowledge question (the same is true of essay prescribed titles, as it is for the knowledge question guiding the old assessment task : Presentation), the purpose of the analysis is to illuminate/highlight the knowledge issues, or “problems of knowledge” inherent within the knowledge question. Thus, (i) what particular knowledge issue in the IA prompt does this object – rather than any other, similar, object – illuminate, and what does it contribute to the understanding of this knowledge issue?;
Should the 3 objects be related to each other or connected ?
NO, it is advised against connecting the 3 objects together as it may encourage you writing about that connection rather than connecting the object to the overarching IA PROMPT. So each object is distinct but each object MUST LINK TO THE chosen PROMPT
Perhaps, different types of objects can “better” bring out the range of knowledge issues within the IA prompts than is possible with three objects of the same type.
If we keep the objects from the same topic within a theme, for example artificial intelligence, would it be considered too narrow?
Yes you can.
“Students are encouraged to root their exhibition in one of the TOK themes—either the core theme or one of the optional themes” (Guide p.39). So, you “can”, it is one of the central features of the assessment instrument that the students make clear the connections between each object, and the IA prompt, and thus the link to a theme becomes the “skeleton” for orientating the analysis.
In what order should students choose – theme–>prompt–> objects or object–> prompt –> theme?
Or do students choose the prompt first and then look for objects or the other way around?
ANY CAN WORK
But the criteria is based on LINK TO PROMPT
So to choose a prompt and then proceed to look at the world around you with a view to choosing objects which “unpack” the knowledge issues in the prompt can also yield valid insights and make for easier writing however reflecting on objects that you encounter, and then choosing a prompt to “fit” the objects would also work
If a student uses a painting created in Visual Arts class as an object for the TOK Exhibition, is that considered “double-dipping” or academic dishonesty, as the same object is used for two different assessments?
NO. “Double-dipping” refers to using the same complete piece of work for more than one assessment. So, for example, using an entire IA in Chemistry in an Extended Essay, or a section of an EE for a History IA is quite clearly academically dishonest. However, in response to the example given in the question given that a “painting created in Visual Arts class” is only one piece amongst many submitted for assessment, and in ToK it would form only a small part of the IA, the issue of ‘double-dipping’ does not arise. There may well be some small amount of “overlap” in terms of what the student “has to say about” the artwork in question (though it will in all likelihood be unlikely that the student’s Visual Art reflections will have the same epistemological orientation as it will in the ToK IA)