Teaching interview

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I've got an interview for the GTP (graduate teaching programme) in a couple of weeks and I'm really nervous. Does anyone have any interview tips? I've never had a 'proper' interview before and it really scares me.

You may well know this already, but you can fake eye contact (very important in interviews) by looking at your interviewers' lips. Unless these folks are really astute, they won't perceive the difference -- and it will probably make all the difference to you. It will likely also help you to focus on the questions they're asking you. Practice and see how easy it is.

Know your resume inside-out and be prepared with your own (smart) questions about the job. I'm sure that there are tons of websites that have this more general type of advice.

Or, let your vision kind of fuzz out and watch (and lightly scan) the entire eye slit area.

Generally, you just want to give bland, plain-vanilla answers.

'Yes, I realize it's going to take a lot of work, and I'm willing to do the work. And in fact, I'm kind of looking forward to it.'

That kind of thing.

Even if the interviewer is personable and engaging and discloses something about their life, you only want to medium disclose (important). You're not lying or hiding. You're simply disclosing a medium amount appropriate for a first meeting.


NOTE: I struggle with this all. I realize the above advice may sound as though I'm advocating being phoney. More I'm thinking, simply allow it to be what it is, which is usually superficial, sometimes it is medium. At times, if I don't have much going on in my life on the social front, I can find myself really looking forward to these kinds of events, and hope the person will become a friend. And that is just way unrealistic. The person is usually an HR person (or in the case of an university, an admissions person) and won't even be involved in the day-to-day. I'll remember it, because it's an intense interaction for me. However, for the person, it's just routine. If I see them again and expressively say hi, he or she will probably say hi back, but they probably won't really remember me.

Thanks for the advice really helps! I've been practising 'eye contact' (looking at the bridge of someone's nose, lol), but I think it's too artificial so the idea of scanning the eye area might work better. Medium disclosure is another really good idea- I have a tendency to either say nothing and freeze up or say far too much so I'm going to prepare as much as possible to say before I go in so that I don't panic. I just wish I knew what sort of thing they're likely to ask, I hate not feeling ready! I'm also a bit scared about there being more than one person interviewing (it's an interview panel) because it's hard to know who to look at, and more people makes me more likely to 'freeze' and not be able to say anything. I really want the job though :s I've wanted to be a teacher since I was 5!

Just posting again to say thanks again for the advice, really helped! Had the interview yesterday, won't find out until January which is annoying but so glad it's out the way. There was only one main interviewer which helped coz I could just focus on him, and he had glasses so I looked at the rims of them as 'eye contact' which seemed to work. Luckily he got me talking about topics that usually I can talk about forever so I didn't have a problem with not being able to say anything although I wasn't sure when to stop talking and talked over him by mistake a couple of times, and I think he had to interrupt me a bit. Apart from that it went better than I thought it would .

Good for you! And you don't need to be perfect. And the fact that you really want to teach is a significant, significant positive.

I hope you get the job.

Thanks won't find out till January/February which is a bit annoying. Even if I don't, I'm really glad I've done a 'real' interview, really useful experience and should make it less scary next time.