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Personal and Shared Knowledge

Run the Personal and Shared Knowledge MicroSim Fullscreen

About This MicroSim

This interactive infographic helps students examine the two-directional relationship between personal knowledge (what an individual knows through experience, skill, and memory) and shared knowledge (what communities hold collectively through publication, institutions, and cultural systems). Bidirectional arrows with labeled mechanisms show how knowledge flows in both directions.

Bloom Level: Analyze (L4) Learning Objective: Examine the two-directional relationship between personal and shared knowledge by tracing how knowledge moves between the individual and the community.

How to Use

  1. Explore the example cards -- Click any card in the Personal Knowledge zone (left, teal) or Shared Knowledge zone (right, amber) to reveal a 2-3 sentence narrative explaining how that piece of knowledge moves between personal and shared domains.
  2. Read the arrow labels -- The center arrows show mechanisms of knowledge transfer: Publication, Teaching, and Cultural Transmission flow from personal to shared; Education, Reading, and Apprenticeship flow from shared to personal.
  3. Add your own examples -- Type a knowledge example in the text input at the bottom, then click "+ Personal" or "+ Shared" to categorize it. Click your new card to see a reflection prompt.
  4. Toggle arrow labels -- Use the "Hide Arrow Labels" / "Show Arrow Labels" button to test whether you can recall the mechanisms without prompts.

Iframe Embed Code

You can add this MicroSim to any web page by adding this to your HTML:

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<iframe src="https://dmccreary.github.io/theory-of-knowledge/sims/personal-shared-knowledge/main.html"
        height="582px"
        width="100%"
        scrolling="no"></iframe>

Lesson Plan

Grade Level

IB Diploma Programme (ages 16-19)

Duration

10-15 minutes

Prerequisites

  • Familiarity with the TOK distinction between personal and shared knowledge
  • Understanding of Areas of Knowledge (AOKs)

Activities

  1. Exploration (5 min): Students click through all six pre-loaded example cards, reading the narratives about how each piece of knowledge crosses between personal and shared domains.
  2. Categorization (5 min): Students use the "Add Your Own" input to contribute 3-5 knowledge examples from their own lives, deciding whether each is primarily personal or shared knowledge.
  3. Discussion (5 min): In pairs, students discuss: Is any knowledge purely personal or purely shared? What does the bidirectional flow suggest about the nature of knowledge itself?

Assessment

  • Can the student identify at least two mechanisms by which personal knowledge becomes shared?
  • Can the student explain how shared knowledge is internalized as personal knowledge?
  • Can the student categorize novel examples and justify their categorization?

References

  1. International Baccalaureate Organization. Theory of Knowledge Guide. IBO, 2022.
  2. Polanyi, Michael. Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy. University of Chicago Press, 1958.
  3. Nonaka, Ikujiro, and Hirotaka Takeuchi. The Knowledge-Creating Company. Oxford University Press, 1995.