TOK

On Tuesday 17th November 2015, we had the pleasure to listen to a lecture given by Wojciech Kotecki, an renown architect and urbanist. The title of the lecture was 'Playing the City'. First, the lecturer introduced himself and showed us a couple of pictures of the convention bureau in Katowice, which he and his colleagues had designed, and which is one of his favourite designs. He mentioned also that his project of the Town Hall in Konstancin was chosen the best of all the submissions and is being realised now. The architect is also a contest judge in the Polish Architects Union. Inspired by games After listing most of the projects he has done in the past, Wojciech Kotecki told us what inspired him to become an architect. He said that in the past he was not the best student and h...

On the 30th of April the students had the opportunity to, as part of the school’s TOK course, participate in a very interesting meeting titled “Digital Restoration: The Second Life of a Film” (“Rekonstrukcja Obrazu: Drugie Życie Filmu”). The guest speakers – Mr Michał Wielgosz, Mr Jędrzej Sabliński and Mr Łukasz Rutkowski – represented the closely-associated companies of DiFactory, reKino and Soundplace. All of the aforementioned are companies linked with the film industry, where DiFactory specifically deals with digital image processing and commercial post production of films, and reKino specializes in the digital enhancement of moving image and restoration of old films. A great deal of the meeting consisted of the guest speakers explaining the technical side of their business. Wh...

On Thursday, March 19, our IB students had a TOK BLOK that ‘slightly’ differed from the usual ones. The guest speaker, Dr. Piotr Szymczak, an Assistant Professor at the Institute of English Studies at the University of Warsaw (and an ex-TOK teacher in our school) introduced the students to the way our brains work under different circumstances beginning by involving each of them through making them write anonymous tests with questions that tricked their minds. What knowledge did they actually acquire? First of all, we do not have one mind, but two. Or to put it in a more precise way, we have two separate systems in our brain. One is responsible for fast, intuitive and snap judgements, whereas the second one is slow, deliberate, analytic and careful. When we encounter seemingly simple...

In one of our recent TOK sessions, we were able to see “The Miracle Worker”, a movie that, indeed, is the one neglected in Poland. It tells the story of Helen Adams Keller (Patty Duke), a writer who lost her sight and hearing as an infant, and her struggle with the obstacle. Fortunately she was able to learn how to communicate with the world, on behalf of Annie Sullivan (Annie Bancroft) who herself had to deal with similar problem. I am sure that WE, as generally healthy people, do not wonder what the person with such barriers has to conquer, and this is what struck me the most. Nowadays people complain about everything, they hurry everywhere, they lack sense, paradoxically possessing all senses. Just make a quick experiment, close your eyes, use earplugs, and observe what happens....

Our first day in Osieck's "Pod Sosnami" consisted of 3 meals, 3 intensive blocks of work in 3 groups and a movie with 3 outstanding actors (J. Cusack, D. Hoffman and R. Weisz). Extended essay and body language The first work block was with Mr Brian Williamson, who gave a lecture about the so called EE - the extended essay. Now we know what task is ahead of us and how often we must face deadlines and that procrastination should be a word belonging to the past. After noting all the be-all and end-all about the 4,000 words that we'll have to deliver over the next 2 years. We learned how the way we talk or the way we move tells other people something about our emotions or our character. For example, we would never have thought that one could communicate with the "number langu...