How do I structure my ToK Exhibition Commentary ?
Full & detailed explanations of all ToK Exhibition prompts are available at this link.
This includes suggestions for knowledge claims and objects.
The question that I am asked most often about the ToK Exhibition is "How do I structure my ToK Exhibition commentary?". This question is understandable given the rather peculiar nature of this assessment. The ToK Exhibition Commentary requires students to reflect on how ToK manifests itself in their everyday lives (an exercise in reflection), but then assesses that reflection against standardising criteria (an exercise in reliability) - those two things are difficult to put together.
Use of exemplars to understand the structure of the ToK Exhibition Commentary.
I recommend that students use the exemplary ToK Exhibition Commentaries that are issued by IB to develop an understanding of ways in which to structure the commentary. Students can do a paragraph by paragraph analysis of what is contained in each paragraph to understand the possible structures.
Here I do this with one of my commentaries:
Hopefully you can see how I have identified the main function of each paragraph to work out what the structure of the commentary is for one object. I recommend that students do this with the IB Exemplars (I can't share them here because IB owns the copyright of them, but you can get them from your ToK teacher).
Summary structure for the ToK Exhibition Commentary.
There is no single correct structure for the ToK Exhibition commentary. However, after analysing the high scoring exemplars, and careful reading of the IB ToK Examiner's reports (the "Subject Report") I have devised the following structure. This structure covers all of the elements that IB are looking for when they assess your ToK Exhibition:
You shouldn't use the term "Knowledge Claim" in your commentary, just embed the claim inside the commentary. Only include ToK Concepts if they're useful to explain your knowledge claim in terms of the prompt.
If you want help with your ToK Exhibition Commentary you can book a coaching session using this link, or you can book 3 sessions at a reduced price here.
Best of luck with the commentary, stay Tok-Tastic!
Daniel,
Lisbon, May 2023