Interviewing, a Skill on Its Own

Throughout the semester, Dr. Smirnova has taught us the value of authentic assessment, "a form of assessment in which students are asked to perform real-world tasks that demonstrate meaningful application of essential knowledge and skills" (Mueller). Once again, she has modeled for us how to integrate into the classroom authentic assessments as opposed to more traditional evaluations in the "final" assignment: The Job Interview. 
For the assignment, our class of seven teacher candidates was separated into the roles of administrators and interviewee hopefuls. Each administrator was to design interview questions that zeroed in on one of three models of instruction: behavioral, information processing, and social interaction. Thus, interviewees had to channel all that they had learned about planning, implementing, and reflecting upon diverse lesson methods in the course. Additionally, administrators asked questions about forming objectives, incorporating technology, and integrating specific disciplines into the social studies curriculum. Thus, the job interview required interviewees, as well as administrators in picking the questions and evaluating interviewees' responses, to indicate mastery of the course objectives just as a final examination would assess. However, instead of determining whether the teacher candidates were capable of selecting correct responses or writing brief essays on a concept, the interview allowed teacher candidates to practice explaining their thinking and demonstrating their competence orally in the same manner they will need to when entering the job market. 
As the administrator with a preference for the information processing model, I imagined that I was hiring teachers to work in the school I opened, Enlightenment Academy. I described that the imaginary school's mission is to promote in its students an appreciation for reason and individuality, just as was the hallmark of the Enlightenment era in late seventeenth century Europe. Furthermore, I asserted that my goal in establishing this school was to create an environment in which students can learn and explore in ways motivated by their own natural curiosity. In other words, the school runs on the philosophy that we would rather set the stage for students to embark upon their own journey of exploration to find answers and make decisions, than provide students with an inauthentic learning experience in which all answers are provided by teachers. With this background information, interviewees knew to prepare themselves for questions about the information processing model and inquiry method of instruction. Scoring teacher candidates on a rubric that included preparation, first impressions, personal attributes, attitude, appearance, and quality of responses, it was easy to adopt the eyes of a critical interviewer. It became clear very early in the interviews which candidates understood the model and could present ideas clearly and succinctly and which could not.
In terms of actually responding to questions examining pedagogical knowledge, teacher candidates were expected (according to the rubric) to provide well-constructed, confident, and genuine responses, often citing resources, and providing examples from their own fieldwork experiences. It was in this area that many teacher candidates fell short as they attempted to answer with more generic, broad statements, and not with their own experiences. For example, I asked a specific follow-up question to a broad non-descriptive answer to one of my previous questions: "What would the students be doing during an inquiry lesson?" The teacher candidate replied, "I don't know," despite having already taught an inquiry lesson in fieldwork. Therefore, this teacher candidate could have easily referred back to her own experience even if she did not know the stages of the inquiry lesson or the five Es during the interview and commented on her own lesson, and what students were required to accomplish during that lesson.
I asked the following five questions while interviewing candidates:

1. What type of music do you associate with the information processing model of instruction?
2. If I walked into your classroom during an inquiry lesson, what would I see?
3. How would you incorporate technology into an inquiry lesson focusing on the discipline of “geography”?
4. You have a diverse class that consists of the following students: 3 gifted, 10 average, 3 LD, 7 ELL, 1 ADHD, and a selective mute student --- How will this impact the choice of methods you utilize in the classroom?
5. What is the one question you would most like to explore at this moment using the inquiry process?

I believe this was a good range of questions, that allowed me to ascertain the strengths and weaknesses of the candidates, and provided an honest sampling of candidates' understanding and potential to apply the information processing model. At first, I did not think the first question, which I found strange for a formal interview, would produce thoughtful responses indicative of pedagogical knowledge. However, it became my favorite question because all of the candidates had a unique answer and from their explanations of their answers, I was able to garner information about their thinking processes. My favorite response to this question was Amanda's, as she indicated that the information processing model is most clearly associated with rap because rap music requires you to think about the lyrics just as information processing requires deep thinking. As to the other teacher candidates, I liked Nicole B.'s response to the third question in which she provided specific examples of how technology can be incorporated to integrate geography into the curriculum referencing Google Earth and Skype. She went on to describe a current events lesson she taught in which she utilized Google Earth to show pictures from countries around the world who were working to empower women. Additionally, I appreciated that Nicole S. was able to answer the second question delineating the steps of an inquiry lesson without hesitancy. She described that she would pre-assess the steps of the inquiry process, present students with a problem, place students in groups so they could solve the problem together talking about the information, and then presenting their solutions to the class. Nonetheless, she could have improved the answer further by discussing her own experience teaching an inquiry lesson. Similar to Nicole S., Ainsley also described in detail the steps of an inquiry lesson, but then expanded upon how she would determine if students were mastering the objectives. She described that she would circulate and take anecdotal notes while students were working, and would pay particular attention to whether students were forming their own questions and asking them to their peers, as a sign of deep thinking and analyzing.  

Thus, I valued when they utilized specifics from their fieldwork experiences, however was disappointed that not a single candidate discussed research that they had studied. For example, as I was asking questions about the information processing model, the candidates could have expanded upon their artifact bag lessons (no one mentioned artifact bag), and referenced the Fuhler, Farris, and Nelson (2006) article, "Building literacy skills across the curriculum: Forging connections with the past through artifacts." Overall, this experience as an administrator has allowed me to better understand what interviewers are looking for in interview responses, and has caused me to be much more cognizant of the errors that can be easily made.

References

Fuhler, C., Farris, P., & Nelson, P. (2006). Building literacy skills across the curriculum: Forging connections with the past through artifacts. The Reading Teacher, 59(7), 646-659.

Harvard Extension School. (2013, March 27). How to Ace an Interview: 5 Tips from a Harvard Career Advisor. Retrieved May 7, 2015, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHDrj0_bMQ0