A TOK presentation is another important component of this course. One third of your final grade is based on the presentation, so you should really try your best.This year we have to film all our presentations and send the films to the IB for assessment, so it is particularly important that we have high quality presentations. What would a really good presentation be like?
To get an idea of this we will firstly look at the assessment criteria. In my next post I will show you some video samples produced by IBO and comment them. But now let's look at the assessment criteria of presentations.
Your presentation will be assessed using four different criteria:
- Identification of knowledge issues
An excellent presentation identifies a knowledge issue that is clearly relevant to the real life situation/contemporary problem
Lets imagine you would want to a presentation on Is globalisation ethical? How could you link such a 'big' topic to a real life situation?
You could start by researching the idea of globalisation and ethical debate around it. In about 2 minutes I was able to find an interesting New York Times article through news.google.com regarding rights and wrongs of globalisation. This contains real life information about globalisation, such as what people in different countries think about it.
- Treatment of knowledge issues.
An excellent presentation shows a good understanding of knowledge issues in the context of real life situation/contemporary problem
Does globalisation have anything to do with your life or is it just a big concept?
Let's think about it.
Did you buy ice coffee today in Flintstones? If you did you supported a multinational coffee company which most likely pays peanuts to coffee farmers in Colombia. That was an ethical decision on your part with global impact although you were just wanted to have a cup of ice coffee. Same logic applies to many other products you consume.
Tell me what globalisation and ethics mean for your life. Tell me what they mean to those farmers in Colombia. Tell me what they mean to that big multinational company? Give me your interpretations. Get it?
- Knower's perspective
To get an excellent grade you should provide arguments and examples, show an individual approach and demonstrate why your presentation topic is significant.
Again your personal voice is being emphasised. You should actually try to argue something. A presentation that just lists pros and cons of globalisation is unlikely to get a very high grade. What do you think? Are some examples of globalisation you have covered in your presentation, in you mind, right or wrong. Tell me why you think they are right or wrong?
Select examples that are interesting, topical, relevant to you. Talk about a Julio who is a 14 year old boy working on coffee plantation, not only sales figures of Nestle and some fair trade companies. Give a story a face.
So what? What is the significance of me knowing all this about coffee trade? So what if child labour is used in China to produce Nike shoes I am wearing? Can you make a connection? Your purchase may be supporting a company that is expoiting someone somewhere. Does this make you think twice about consuming these products ... how about buying fair trade coffee instead?
- Connections
An excellent presentation shows how the question (and I do want your presentation titles to be questions!) could be approached from different perspectives and considered their implications in related area.
The ethics of globalisation topic could, for example, be approached from perspectives of the individual farmer, the consumer, the economic development.
An important part of the connections section is that you link your presentation to knowledge issues i.e. ask yourself: how can we know? is this knowledge reliable? In this case of coffee trade issue ... am I just believing fair trade propaganda, or is there really something to argument that big coffee multinationals are exploiting farmers? Should I instead believe the multinationals when they claim they are providing job opportunities and creating wealth by their investments?
Be critical about the sources of information you use. Tell where you got the information and if in your mind this information is trustworthy.
When you draw your conclusions try to justify your claims as well as you can. Try to make your arugment such that it mostly appeals to reason, i.e. it makes sense to believe what you are saying.
