Two tasks, one subject

TOK is assessed twice. The exhibition asks you to show TOK in the world: three real objects, one question, 950 words. The essay asks you to argue: one title, two areas of knowledge, 1600 words. They share a subject and very little else. The exhibition is won by the objects you choose and by how exactly you explain each one. The essay is won by the question you actually answer and by whether you decide anything. Being strong in one task does not make you strong in the other, so prepare for each on its own terms.

This section gives you a guide to each task, with a two-page printable version, an outline of the parts and a one-page checklist for each to keep on your desk while you draft. The advice follows the IB’s own guide and rubrics, the examiners’ published comments, and the best TOK companions.¹

The essay counts twice as much as the exhibition, and essay marks are usually lower. If you plan your effort by weight and by risk, the essay is where most of it should go.²

How the marks work

Both tasks are marked out of 10, in five bands: Excellent (9–10), Good (7–8), Satisfactory (5–6), Basic (3–4) and Rudimentary (1–2). The marker does not tick off a list. They read the whole piece, ask the one question in the table above, and decide which band describes the work as a whole. Only then do they decide between the two marks in that band.³ Two things follow from this. First, no single feature rescues a script: a perfect bibliography does not lift an essay that answers the wrong question. Second, one serious fault can pull a whole script down a band, because the marker’s overall impression is the mark.

The IB publishes a short list of words for each band. For the essay, the top band is insightful, convincing, accomplished, lucid; the middle band is acceptable, mainstream, adequate, competent; the bottom bands are descriptive, superficial, limited. The word that matters most is descriptive. A descriptive script tells the reader about things. An analytical script uses those things to decide something. Most of the advice in this section is about moving from the first to the second.

How TOK counts in the diploma

Your two marks are combined, the essay counting twice: essay × 2 + exhibition, out of 30.⁴ The IB turns that total into a grade from A (excellent) to E (elementary), with grade boundaries set anew each session. The TOK grade then meets your Extended Essay grade in this table, which gives up to 3 of the diploma’s 45 points:

An E in TOK or in the Extended Essay means no diploma, however good your six subjects are. So does a missing component: no exhibition or no essay means no TOK grade. The other failing conditions: fewer than 24 points in total; CAS not completed; a grade 1 in any subject; grade 2 three or more times; grade 3 or below four or more times; fewer than 12 points from higher-level subjects or 9 from standard-level subjects (with three of each); and any case of academic misconduct.

The practical point: the TOK grade is worth at most three points, but it is the one part of the diploma where a single weak grade fails everything. Paired with a strong Extended Essay, even a C in TOK still earns two points.

What the course has already trained

You have practised the hardest parts of both tasks for a year without calling them assessment preparation.

• Commit before we compare is the essay’s central move. An essay that sets out two sides and never says which one wins is the commonest middle-band essay. You have been required to pick a side, in writing, in every lesson.
• Name your price is what the essay rubric calls implications: if your answer is right, what does it cost, and what follows? It is the part of the essay most often left out. You have written one every time you signed a commitment.
• One real case per lesson is what both rubrics mean by specific examples and specific real-world contexts. A named case with a date and a source is evidence. “A scientist might…” is not.
• Checking the footnote is the habit the exhibition’s evidence descriptor rewards. Missing or weak evidence is one of the commonest reasons an exhibition mark is lowered.
• The Logic unit (an argument has premises and a conclusion; valid is not the same as sound) is the toolkit for writing a thesis and testing it against objections.

Two habits from the lessons need adjusting. In class the “positions” are often handed to you; in the essay you must build them from the title yourself. And in class the price comes after the choice; in the essay the implications have to be argued, not just stated in a final sentence.

Using AI tools

The IB treats text, ideas and images produced by AI tools like any other source: if you use them, you must say so and cite them, and the work you submit must be your own.⁵ There is a more practical problem. Links copied from a chatbot often end in a tag such as utm_source=chatgpt.com. A marker who sees that tag in a bibliography sees it. It shows that a source was found by a machine and probably never opened. If a tool points you to a source, open it, read the part you use, and cite the source itself, with the tag removed. A fact you have not checked is not evidence. A chatbot summary of a fact you have not checked is worse.