5 (More) Potential Interview Questions - Part 2

Nancy Anderson
Posted by in Education & Training


In my last post, I took a look at five sample interview questions that have the potential for being asked. If you do not have a large amount of experience with interviews, hopefully these type of sample questions will better prepare you for some of the not-so-commonly thought of questions that might be presented during your job search. As mentioned before, your resume is a brief overview of your talents and experience, but the interview questions are where the interviewer can find out more details about the real you. This is important when considering someone for a teaching position around children, and so you may find some questions come your way that are not necessarily related to the job or your experience. You need to be prepared for any questions like these, and be ready with a well formulated professional answer.

Last time we looked at things like your personal pleasure reading preferences, hobbies, describing yourself, why you got into teaching, and some of your thoughts on teaching. Now let us take a look at some additional questions, such as:

"What is your philosophy of education?" - In the last post we briefly looked at why you got into teaching, and this would be related in a small way. What is it you believe about educations, its goals and purposes? What about that drew you to become an educator? What do you believe to be the the ultimate value of education? Basically, what do you believe about education and why?

"How would you describe your teaching style?" - There are many different ways that various teachers approach their field of education. Some of it has to do with what is being taught, the age group being taught, etc. and a lot of it has to do with your learned and preferred methods. What is the driving force and thoughts behind why you do it the way you do?

"With all that is involved with teaching, how do you manage your time to cover it all?" - As you know, teaching is not just spending a few hours in a classroom with students. For the teacher there are hours of preparation, test grading, lesson planning, etc. How do you efficiently manage all of that currently? As teachers gain more and more years of experience, they tend to develop plans that help them manage their time and stay organized; so share some of your methods.

"What do you consider to be your greatest teaching success?" - In your experiences, look at some of the highlights, the high water marks of your accomplishments. This type of question is open to almost any kind of exciting success story you have been a part of, so have some thoughts in mind for just such an occasion.

"What do you think are the most difficult aspects of being a teacher?" - You have high water marks, but likewise you will probably have low ones too. What aspects of the career do you find less appealing? In this type of questions, you must be very careful not to gripe or complain about things, but always try to turn things around and make them a positive overall. Maybe tell a story of a prior struggle that really got you down, but end it with how you learned from it, overcame it, and no longer find it a difficult situation. Lots of aspects can be less than desirable, but they can all be learning experiences that can eventually be overcome.


There are more to come, and hopefully these few will help to stimulate thoughts about other such questions, and help you to be prepared with a professional and well thought out response. As always, if you have experiences to share, please feel free to share by commenting below.
 


Jeff McCormack resides in Virginia Beach, VA. where he works as a web designer by day. In his off time he is a husband, father, mail order book store manager, and musician. Aside from being a freelance writer for this Utilities Jobsite blog, he also seeks to assist in career choices and information by contributing to other Nexxt blog sites.

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