The key concepts are 12 ideas of particular significance that provide us with an effective way of scaffolding thoughts about the course and its relationship with the real world, and help us integrate TOK with the rest of the DP.
Faculty member can explore the key concepts via a set of padlets, which also indicates how each concept links to the AOKs and themes. We update the padlets every month by adding new media sources and unpacking suggestions.
What are the 12 key concepts?
The 12 key concepts have been identified for their particularly significant relationship to knowledge, and developing a strong understanding of them is central to the TOK course.
Exploring and applying them will help students make sense of how knowledge is produced and used across the core and optional themes and the areas of knowledge.
Students should draw on the concepts as much as possible in both assessment tasks. We have identified related exhibition prompts for each concept and indicated how they connect.
The key concepts are also a powerful tool for integrating TOK with the rest of the DP, and below you will find guidance to help non-TOK teachers bring them into their own classrooms.
Join us to access the key concept padlets
The padlets give you a rich and regularly updated collection of real-world examples and discussion questions for each of the 12 key concepts.
We have made the Responsibility padlet freely available below so you can get a sense of what the full resource looks like. To access the rest, join us!
Download our free key concept banner!
Follow this link to download 12 free key concept banners. Each one is presented alongside a brilliant quote to provide a quick overview of its meaning, and prompt debate. Faculty members have access to five further designs, as well as access to the full resource, and all our other materials!
Subscribe to our free monthly TOK newsletter
Our newsletter, The Examined Life, delivers 8 thought-provoking real-world stories to your inbox, three of which we unpack in detail to challenge assumptions, introduce brilliant thinkers, and build a library of examples for your essay, exhibition, and UA portfolio.
It is the easiest way to stay connected to the ideas that matter most and develop the habits of authentic critical thinking. Subscribe here.