ToK essay help! (Starting)

[rrswong]

Hi everyone!

ToK is really strangely taught at our school, and we're supposed to be starting our drafts of our essays. We've been given structures and stuff, and told we needed to find knowledge issues in our topics, but I have no idea how to actually start writing down anything substantial, so advice on how you guys started yours would be much appreciated. Also, all the knowledge issues I think up blow up to be giant discussions in themselves - is there a point where you should stop?

Thank you so much!

[Green]

My TOK teacher gave me the advice of choosing a question that is already in the form of a question. She believes it has a more direct way of addressing the essay and it could be easier for the students.

I'm not sure how true that is, but it works for me.

For a start, I'm assuming you'll read the questions you are assigned and pick ones you are comfortable with.

Try to underline or point out the key words in a question, this should allow you to focus more specifically on an area and might give you a better idea of where your essay will lead and what knowledge issues you can bring out from it.

When you're starting always ask yourself "what" and define things. For example, if the question is addressing belief, (and if you've identified that as a key term in the question) try and explain what belief is, or define it. Theres usually 2 or 3 things to define in a question, so try to get that done in your introduction and identify your knowledge issues.

I believe, if your knowledge issues are in the form of a question- once you have argued about it, and have come to a conclusion, that is when you should stop.

For example, do aliens exist? (I apologize, this is a really bad example )

A couple of paragraphs should discuss things such as areas of knowledge, such as science and provide arguments for this case. Perhaps counter-arguements after it.

But once you think you've found an answer to that question, stop.

I guess sometimes people tend to go off-topic and thats when the discussion becomes endless. Stick to the question and knowledge issues, I think that will give you a limit.