Advice For Job Interview, Reception Class

[Guest]

Firstly sorry for the ramble, but I have got my knickers in a twist...

 

I have a job interview next week it's in a different authority at the opposite end of the country! There will be an interview, and also I have to do a presentation and teach a group.

The group of 15 children are reception age, it is for 20 mins. I am in a bit of a panic about the teaching bit, and I just need someone to talk sense to me.

I have got a good starting activity with a puppet (that relates to a book I plan on reading). My dilemma is the book is pretty much a story based around counting. However the presentation has to be around language development, should I scrap my original idea and do a language/communication based activity to back up what I am saying in my presentation?

The activity I have planned is quite open and not really based on a learning objective as such, but I know it will engage the children and I don't want to set myself up to fail by trying to prove I have fulfilled a learning objective, but I am stressing that the panel will be looking for'learning'. I haven't really planned to 'challenge' the children is really what I am saying !

My priority is to engage the children, especially as some of the candidates are internal and know the children, but I am comfortable with the book and activities I have chosen as they are a bit different. I could show development of learning on a planning sheet for further use, as 20 mins is not much time to develop a specific piece of learning. Arrrrgggh it's driving me mad, and I am wasting valuable planning time going round in circles.

 

Has anyone any good advice about inspiring children during the interview process

[Susan]

I could be completely off track but I would think that your activity is ok because you will be able to engage with it and show your skills of interaction etc--all important for learning to take place.

Also dont forget that maths also has its own language and language development is not confined to CLL.

 

Hope others will be along to help too.

Good luck.

[Guest]

Thanks, and I do agree,it's just not challenging. But I need to stop stressing and get on with the other bits of prep. Anyone got any advice on hot topics for interview questions?

[Guest]

I have been there with the worrying and stomache churning before an interview so feel your pain! Without knowing the children and where they are at it is really difficult for you to be able to plan to challenge them. I would say that you need to be comfortable with the activity that you have chosen so go with what you have planned. The interview panel will be looking for you to engage with the children, how you deal with anyone off task, your body language etc but I do think that they will be needing a plan with a learning objective etc. Without knowing what you are doing exactly it is difficult to say but I would think that you could with tweaking bring round whatever you are doing to have more of a language focus ie could the children talk in their talk partners during the session, could they have a puppet to share to use to practice something you have introduced? I use a puppet alot called Sid who is learning to count and often gets it wrong! Sid says the numbers but misses out numbers/adds ones in randomly etc and then the children wag their finger at him and teach him to do it properly.

 

Hot topics I guess would be talk for writing, enabling environment use of TAs (with the change in ofsed criteria failure to use your TAs properly means an unsatisfactory therefore TAs need to be taking higher or lower ability focus groups when you have carpet sessions in Maths (that's what my head has me doing anyway!)so that every child moves forward in some way in the less.

 

My experience has always been that the internal candidate gets the job but my school recently and very controversially employed someone that none of us knew even though there were 2 internal candidates and the reason being that the head and governors felt we needed some new blood with different skills that could help our school to move forward-if you can convey that somehow in your interview that would stand you in good stead.

Good luck-hope it goes well!

Deb

[Guest]

I always made sure to share the learning objective with the children too in my interviews - e.g. today we're going to practice counting to 10 - phrased in a completely child friendly way and at the end of the session ask the children to say if they thought they'd done it - no matter how long/short the session was. It was always commented on as a positive in my interviews so it might be useful to know. As for topics for interview things like how to deal with a difficult parent always came up and how to extend learning in the outside area or a specific area of the curriculum.