Teacher Talk: How to succeed in an interview for a teaching position.

and welcome back to Beyond Survival, the new teacher podcast. My name is Jamie Topp. Today's episode is this week's Teacher Talk, which is a 15 minute talk that's posed an aspect of being a new teacher. So for this talk, what I'm gonna do is answer the question, how can we succeed for an interview for a teaching position? Now I'm doing this because I'm conscious at this time of year, lots of teachers are either going in for their first teaching interview or potentially even thinking about a change of scope and thinking about interview preparation. So I'm gonna acknowledge a couple of things first of all. The first is that interviews are a natural, a naturally, excuse me, rather stressful and anxiety-inducing situation. Now for me, as a natural introvert, they are certainly not my strongest aspect. I find them really intimidating and really daunting. But what I've done is I've applied that level of introverted focus into my learning about interviews, preparing for them and trying to get a little bit better at doing. I've also been a head of department, a curriculum leader in a school, and a member of a leadership team where I've done interviews and learned from them. I also now run an English PGD at Embanépe University. And over the past few weeks, I have done about 40 interviews for that course. I'm gonna share some learning from them as well. And we'll break that down into three steps. The first is what you can do in preparation. The second is what you can do on the day of the interview. And the final area will be answering some of those challenging questions. And I'm gonna do all that in the next 13 minutes. So let's look at the first part, preparation. That this part is absolutely integral. It's integral because obviously the more you can do in preparation, the more likely you are to feel calm, in control and focused on the interview day itself. Now you can start that preparation phase by looking at a school's website. And school's websites are really helpful in terms of their core purpose is articulating some of the values of the school. And obviously you want to make sure that those values align with your own. And the school might be a good fit for you. And once you've clarified that, you wanna make sure that the messaging that is on that school website is running through your interview answers and your interview preparation. And another really good tip that was given to me when I was first preparing for interviews was actually visit the school locality. Walk around and think about what's it like to be a young person in this school and think about the school context. And that can be really helpful again and just giving you a bit of knowledge for when you begin on the interview. Again, the practice obviously is the core of absolutely everything. So the more you can think through your interview answers, the more you can practice articulating them, the more confident you'll be in the day. So I used to make little cards with my interview answers, my interview questions, give me a ralla and bullet point, some key answers on that card. So then I've got the key messaging I wanna get across when it comes to answering that question. And then asking people to support you in that, articulating your answers to those key questions over and over again so they become really really natural. So that's a little bit about the preparation phase. Now what can you do when it comes to the day itself? Now obviously before you arrive at the school, you're trying to make that day as less anxiety and juicing as possible. So you're thinking, how am I gonna get to the school? How am I gonna make sure that I'm bringing the best version of myself to that school interview? And that might be, there's lots of various ways you can do that, but even thinking about, and we talked about this on a show a couple of weeks ago, the breathing you might do to help you feel calm as you go in, are you the kind of person that needs to go for a run on the day before an interview to get rid of some of that nervous anxiety and do some form of exercise? Now as soon as you arrive on that school context, it's really useful to remember that fundamentally, you are on show. And that all the people involved in that process from the receptions you meet at the start to the young people you engage with, they're all involved in forming a little bit of a judgment about you. And I understand that's intimidating, but it's really important to think about bringing the best version of yourself, the best presence of yourself, the best warmth that you can offer, the best enthusiastic version of you. And in that way, it's useful to think about the interview, I think, in a performativity way. In the same way in the classroom, you're often performing when you're on an interview, you're performing that version of yourself. Now, if you're asked to teach a lesson, which is often the case in terms of your interview preparation, I think it's again really helpful to think about how can I make this lesson a simple and as effective as I possibly can. An interview lesson is not the time to be trying lots of new tricks and tools or trying some really collaborative activity. If someone's watching their interview, they're really looking at you through the lens of, would this person fit in our school context? How do they interact with the young people? And that's massive. How are you communicating with those young people on that interview lesson? Have you got a tool in which you can learn their names and use their names? Are you down on their level? Are you engaging with them? Are you finding out things about those young people? Show casing, lots of warmth. And again, sometimes those lessons might be shorter, they might be little 20-minute segments. And I think again, it's really useful to think about actually what are the young people going to learn in that 20-minute section? Are they going to be able to demonstrate some kind of new skill or articulate what they've learned? Because the interviewer may well ask those young people at the end of the lesson, when you're not there, what did you think of that? What did you think of the teacher? What did you learn in that lesson? What did you like about it? Now, they're not looking for as a perfect lesson. And I think it's useful after the lesson itself to reflect a little bit on it. Because one of the questions you might get asked in the interview is, "How did you feel that lesson when?" So if you can articulate some of the strengths, you think went well, brewing. But if you can also say, "Hmm, if I was going to do that differently, I would do this, this, and this." I would change this. Because one of the key things you're trying to showcase in an interview is you're trying to showcase that you're a reflective practitioner. And you really do think through your practice, without really open-minded lens. So, on the day itself, if you've got that interview lesson, you're thinking about how you appear, you're thinking about the warmth you might convey, you're thinking about the smiling you might do, just to help manage some of that anxiety and again, just to present the best for us in yourself. So, I'll take the final six minutes, and I'll think through some of the interview questions that you might get asked in an interview situation. Now, before I get to those, I guess I'm general advice on answering interview questions. First of all, it's absolutely fine to appear a little bit nervous. I think for me, that's really important because it shows that you care, it shows that you're authentic, and it shows that you really do want this job, and you want the opportunity to work with each other and people. Just totally fine to appear a little bit nervous. They're not expecting some kind of robotic individual. Now, in terms of managing those nerves, it can be really helpful to just take a little pause before you answer a question. Now, that pause allows you to think through what you're going to say, but it also gives you a little bit of breathing room as well to help manage some of those nerves. General advice again, if I think about the interviews I'm doing with the moment, with people who want to become teachers and shouldn't teach us, I think it's helpful not I think it's helpful to keep your answers fairly succinct and fairly clear. Sometimes nervous energy can translate into big, long, rambling answers. And actually, keeping the answers fairly succinct, keeping them fairly clear can be really helpful for an interviewer, for an interviewer, sorry about that. just to track what you're saying and the points you're trying to make. And even just asking the question, once you've finished, that that answers your question, okay, is there any other detail you would like from me? Again, it can be really helpful. An interview for me is a big test of communication skills. And as a teacher, you want to convey the fact that you can communicate succinctly, clearly, and effectively. And that's why that process I talked about at the start, practicing answers, rehearsing answers, is really helpful. Now, another thing I think, and this was my big weakness in terms of how I've approached interviews. I find it really hard to showcase my strengths and to articulate my strengths and to talk through what I was extensively good at. So thinking through, what are your individual strengths before you go to that interview so that you can really talk them through? Do you build fantastic relationships with young people? Do you make sure your lessons are really interesting and engaging? Do you work really, really well as a team? Now, having concrete examples to support that can also be really helpful because it gives it that authenticity. Okay, in the three minutes I've got left, some key questions. A question that I've asked hundreds of times is what does teaching mean to you? And what am I looking for in the answer to that? I'm looking for an understanding, teaching isn't a demanding career, but I'm looking for a sense of passion. I want to hear an articulation that teaching is something that is really important to the interviewer. There is something that is driven towards getting better at. Something they feel authentic in and at home. And quite often people answer that by talking about a teacher that inspired them at school or a teacher they've worked with that's really inspired them. I find that helpful because it helps to clarify some of the interviewer's values and beliefs about teaching as a career. Another core question is tell me about a lesson that you think went well, you've taught. Again, this doesn't need to be a masterpiece, but for me I'm looking for a little bit of creativity. Some interesting things that make that lesson a unique and interesting experience for young people and for students. So again, thinking through some of your lessons, thinking through the approach you take, thinking through what you bring to your lessons that's a little bit different can be really helpful. Another very common question is this idea of teamwork. How do you work well in a team? So if I think about a secondary interview in particular, I'm looking for somebody in my role as a CL. I'm looking for someone who can fit in and collaborate really effectively with a school department or a school team or a primary school context. Obviously the body of staff working really really well together. So finding examples where perhaps you have collaborated really effectively, you've learned well from other people, you've built up really positive relationships. And it's often again common that that might be a question that relates to how you interact with parents. So thinking through if you can give examples, even if you've come from a training year, where you've engaged with a parent, really clearly, you've built up a good relationship with them, and you have understood how to support that parent to support the work of the young person. Behavior is a common one in an interview situation again. So how do you manage challenging behavior? And for me for this question, again, I'm looking for a real understanding of the complexity of working with young people and recognizing that young people all have different needs and bringing different things to the table. And that in terms of managing behavior, you're thinking through and you understand the systems that are in place in the school. You understand how to seek support, you understand consistency in your classroom approach will help to secure positive behavior. And you also understand that how you approach your lessons, your planning can influence that behavior as well. Okay, I said 15 minutes, so I've got one minute, I've run one minute over. Okay, a really common question is what is your biggest weakness or challenge that you're going to overcome? For me, again, I'm looking for authenticity and answer here. So about your self-awareness, about recognizing, for example, that perhaps for you, and I have a really great answer for this just last week, that sometimes, organization and managing different demands can be a challenge for this person. But they talked about what they've done to address that challenge. Had they write really clear lists and they plan out things as far as possible in advance as they can. And they're really focused on addressing that weakness. And if you're going to go for the idea of perfectionism, it's a very common one and it's absolutely fine. But again, do it in a way that's authentic. Highlight how that's something you've tried to manage in terms of stepping away from things, getting a wider perspective on things, seeking feedback on things. So I hope the past 15 minutes or so has been helpful. I've talked about three key areas. What you can do in preparation. What you can do on the day itself. And how you can answer some of these challenging interview questions. What I'll say in conclusion is that sometimes it takes a few interviews before you find the role that's right in terms of the fit for you. So I wish you all the best. If you are going to head for an interview, I'm sure you'll be wonderful. And as always, if I can ask one thing, if you don't mind passing this on, if it's been helpful and supportive for you. And thank you so much for listening.