Edited by: Clifford Hill
Introduction
This packet presents 15 essays that students submitted for evaluation in Theory of
Knowledge (hereafter TOK) during the academic year 1993-94. These essays were selected to serve as exemplars: that is to say, essays that exemplify how experienced assessors in TOK assign a range of scores to student work.
The essays were selected from a larger pool by members of an exemplar committee:
Sue Bastian, Chief Assessor
Charles Freeman, Assistant Assessor
Lucia Harvilchuck, Assistant Assessor
Once the committee members had assigned scores to the essays and assembled them in order, they were sent to three other readers:
John Mackenzie, Deputy Chief Assessor
Lena Rotenberg, Assistant Assessor
Dennis Oberg, Assistant Assessor
Their work confirmed the ranking established by the exemplar committee, although it led to one essay being replaced.
Each essay has been retyped in a consistent format, though spelling, punctuation, and paragraphing have been left intact. Any information that could be used to identify the individual writer has been removed: personal name, IBEX number, name of the school. In the upper left corner of each page, a short version of the
title is given; in the upper right corner, the score assigned to the essay by the exemplar committee is given: first the total score in bold and then the three domain scores for Clarity, Content, and Critical Thought in parentheses.
At the end of each essay is a word count and a paragraph count: these two counts can be used to derive a word-paragraph ratio, which often helps in understanding how well individual writers use paragraphing to organize their essays. For example, the essay on pages 60-61 has 937 words but only 2 paragraphs (the second paragraph itself has only 66 words); not surprisingly, what was essentially a one-paragraph essay received low marks in the domain of Clarity.
Each essay is followed by two kinds of evaluation: the first three, characterized as assessor responses, were prepared by members of the exemplar committee. These evaluations tend to be relatively short and informal since they were built around notes made at the time of initial reading; they illustrate well the variety of responses that TOK assessors can make to an essay in assigning it the same mark.
A longer and more formal kind of evaluation, characterized as a domain analysis, was prepared by Clifford Hill, who served as a consultant on this project (he is the Arthur I. Gates Professor of Language & Education at Teachers College, Columbia University). This evaluation is organized ac-cording to descriptors for the three domains that are provided in Appendix A. The domain analysis makes frequent reference to the student essay, attempting to anchor the evaluation in both specific and global features of the essay (to facilitate such reference, every fifth line in the student essays has been numbered).
Within this packet the essays are ordered according to the scores assigned to them. The scores run from 15 to 5: at seven levels of scoring, a single essay is presented; at four levels, two essays are presented that represent different patterns of domain scoring:
(5-5-4)
14
(5-4-5)
(4-4-3)
11
(3-4-4)
(4-3-2)
9
(3-3-3)
(3-1-2)
6
(2-2-2)
It is hoped that TOK teachers will benefit from reading together two essays that were assigned the same total score but whose domain scores differ in some way.
In addition, the packet contains four pairs of essays written on the same topic. The scores of the paired essays differ by at least 5 marks, thus providing teachers an opportunity to examine essays of widely different quality on the same topic.
15/10
What counts as a good explanation?
14/8
We have eyes to see with, ears to hear with; why then do
we err?
14/9
The worth of anything is measured by how useful it is.
11/6
Of all the ways of knowing, which do you find the most compelling and why?
For those who prefer to use words rather than numbers in evaluating student writing, the exemplar committee assigned the 15 essays in this packet to the following 4 levels:
excellent (the 4 essays scored 13-15)
good (the 4 essays scored 10-12)
satisfactory (the 3 essays scored 8-9)
unsatisfactory (the 4 essays scored 5-7)
Obviously, it is a good deal easier to assign essays to only 4 levels of evaluation.
A final note — those of us who have prepared this packet are keenly aware of how difficult it is to evaluate student writing. While recognizing the inherent limitations in any selection of exemplar essays, we hope that TOK teachers will find this packet useful in refining their own approach to evaluation and make suggestions as to ways in which it can be improved—it is they who will ultimately determine the value of this attempt to provide greater stability in the marking of TOK essays.
Contents
Introduction
Exemplar essays
15 (5-5-5) What counts as a good explanation?
14 (5-5-4) We have eyes to see with, ears to hear with; why then do we err
14 (5-4-5) Respond to the statement that the worth of anything is measured by how useful it is. available upon request
13 (5-4-4) How objective are the methods of science? available upon request
12 (4-4-4) Ethics is confronted with problems of knowledge in much the same manner as other pursuits of truth. available upon request
11 (4-4-3) Discuss and explain the distinction which is usually made between the Human Sciences and the Natural Sciences. available upon request
11 (3-4-4) Of all the ways of knowing, which do you find the most compelling and why?
10 (3-4-3) What counts as a good explanation?
9 (4-3-2) Proving and falsifying hypotheses. available upon request
9 (3-3-3) Respond to the statement that the worth of anything is measured by how useful it is. available upon request
8 (3-2-3) We have eyes to see with, ears to hear with; why then do we err?
7 (3-2-2) “History is part myth, part hope, and part reality.” Comment on this statement in relation to our discussion about the problems of history as a science.
available upon request
6 (3-1-2) Of all the ways of knowing, which do you find the most compelling and why? available upon request
6 (2-2-2) Reality or illusion: that is the question. available upon request
5 (2-1-2) The control of language is power. available upon request
Appendix A Domain descriptors
This packet of exemplar essays has been prepared in the hope that it will strengthen the evaluation of student essays in Theory of Knowledge. We welcome any suggestions as to how the document itself might be improved or how it might be used to strengthen not only evaluation but also curriculum and instruction. Please send your comments to either:
| Sue Bastian, DirectorTeaching Matters475 Riverside DriveNew York, NY 10027 Fax: |
Clifford Hill, DirectorApplied Linguistics ProgramColumbia UniversityNew York, NY 10027 Fax: |