Question it all!

How do you know the world you live in is real? Are our identities a work of art? Is accidental ‘art’ even ‘art’? DRS InternationalSchool explored these questions and more during the TOK Day Celebrations held at the school recently.

Theory of Knowledge or TOK, as it is popularly known, is a part of the DP Core and helps students made transdisciplinary connections across the different subjects to examine how we know what we know. The school celebrated the unique nature and scope of the subject with a series of thought-provoking activities organized by the DP student community.

The day began with ‘Spectrum’, a gallery walk which invited viewers to challenge their assumptions of what art is and where the boundaries of art lie. Students, faculty, parents and invitees throughly enjoyed the interactive displays that made them wonder about the thin boundaries between Art, error, trash, coincidence, vandalism and cruelty, among other concepts.

The Gallery Walk was followed by ‘Game of Realities’, a collaboratively scripted and directed play by the students that explored the illusions that both reality and virtual reality blurs in the gaming world. The play was a modern day adaptation of Plato’s famous Analogy of the Cave. The students’ performance demonstrated their depth of understanding of the classic riddle- how do we know the world we live in is real?

Finally, the day came to an end with the screening of the cult film ‘Inception’, which is also based on the same Analogy. The students watched the film with a new-found appreciation of its nuances and left with more questions than they came with.

The day certainly succeeded in deepening the school community’s understanding of TOK as a core subject and piqued their interest to pursue its questions further!