Being a teacher is incredibly rewarding. After all, you get to shape how your students learn, grow, and see the world around them. It’s a field just about anyone with a passion for mentoring, and the right people and education skills, can break into. Yet, mastering the most common teacher interview questions might be crucial for that perfect position.
Kirsten Horton, a veteran education leader who’s taught pre-K up to third grade in private as well as public schools, started her career as a paralegal before working with students. “If it’s calling you, then that’s where you’re supposed to be and it’s what you’re supposed to be doing,” she tells The Muse.
Despite having been homeschooled most of her life, she has always been fascinated with pop culture’s image of school (think: Mean Girls) and was motivated by the opportunity to tailor students’ learning to their specific needs just as her family did for her.
“I love that no two days are the same. No two classes or years are the same as a teacher. It never gets boring or monotonous,” she says about the perks of the job, adding that working alongside other smart, supportive, and ambitious teachers is another plus.
However, she warned that the field isn’t for everyone: It requires patience, flexibility, collaboration, and a knack for working well with others. These days, Horton not only teaches but regularly assists with hiring and mentoring new staffers, many of whom she’s seen come from varying careers, or even leap into education after retirement.
Like a middle manager in the corporate world, teacher leaders or department chairs like her take some of the work off of the plates of the principal or vice principal by interviewing potential candidates. Because they’re doing the job they’re hiring for, she adds, they also have the best idea of what skills and personality traits to look for.
The more interviews you get, the better your chances of getting hired—apply now to these amazing teacher jobs on The Muse »
Horton says that a typical teacher interview will usually take place at the school you’re applying to. Depending on the type or size of the team, the specificity of the role (for example, whether you'll be working with students with special needs), and the interview round, you may meet with one teacher or staffer (a principal or VP, administrator, or counselor, for example), or multiple at a time.
“A lot of times they intentionally have you meet several members of the school team or even your teaching team. And the purpose of that is for everybody to say, ‘Yes, I could work with this person,’ just because you don’t want to get midway through the year and have a team that’s not working collaboratively together.”
At a bigger public school, she adds, you’re more likely to have a one-on-one interview purely because of demand for teachers on call, whereas at a private school the staff likely have more free time to interview as a group.
But she’s found that because many school leaders were teachers at some point in their careers, they’ll often go easy on interviewees. “They’re used to helping people succeed and really coaching people through,” she says. “So they’re never really trying to throw anything at you that’s going to be overwhelming or trying to stump you. They’re trying to just really bring the best out in you.”
You’ll definitely encounter the more general interview questions like “What are your strengths and weaknesses?” or “Why do you want this job?” But you’ll also face more specific queries about, say, working with students or designing a lesson plan.
And you may even have to answer some fun but curveball questions: Horton loves to ask, “Do you drink coffee in the morning, throughout the day, or not at all?” Not only does it give her a sense of their mindset and energy level, but it also tells her what special order to deliver to them on their first day. (In other words, there’s no wrong answer!)
To help you prepare, check out these common teacher interview questions—as well as advice and examples for how to answer them. Plus, learn what skills and qualities hiring managers are looking for and get some bonus tips for nailing your next teaching interview questions.
No matter the specific role or workplace, hiring managers look for common themes in qualified teaching applicants:
Keep these themes in mind as you prepare for your teaching interview and look for opportunities to communicate them whenever possible—especially in response to these common questions.
Need some tips for writing your teaching resume? Find a full guide here.
“You have to know who you are as an individual and as an educator, and you have to know what you can bring to the school,” says Calvin Brown, a former recruiter at Alignstaffing, an education staffing firm. This question gets to the heart of that passion and self-awareness.
Rule #1: Don’t say, “Summer vacations!” But seriously—this one should be easy to answer. There’s probably something that made you want to get into education. Maybe you enjoy teaching your friends new things, are a facts wizard bursting with knowledge, or love connecting with children. Focus not just on what you like about teaching but also on what you can bring to the table.
For example, you might say: “I really admired my third grade teacher, Mrs. Kim, and even after I left her class I still returned to her for advice and guidance over the years. It’s that sense of warmth and acceptance she provided me that inspired me to become a teacher. I want to be that person others can lean on as they navigate the rough waters of growing up.”
Interviewers want to see that you really want to help students develop inside and outside school—not just push them toward some academic result. Basically, you care about people and their success, and you’ve thought about what that success looks like and how you’ll help students achieve it.
They’re also likely vetting for an alignment of values. “In order to serve kids, the same as parenting, you have to be aligned in your beliefs and your practices before you can go out and influence kids positively,” Horton says.
She adds that even if you’re brand new to teaching, you can still touch on what you would do given the chance to run a classroom. “For example, a lot of people are really looking for somebody who’s going to say that they feel really confident with the age that they’re going to be teaching and that they’re really going to focus on building a positive community versus punitive consequences.”
You’ll want to be honest about your specific style and mindset when it comes to teaching. But also consider what this school’s philosophy is like, and try to emphasize where your values naturally overlap.
For example, you might talk about how you take a community approach to education, which means “knowing that you’re one piece of this person’s journey,” says Mary Findley, Senior Teacher Success Manager at Skillshare and a former Teach for America Core Member and elementary school teacher.
You could answer with: “I believe when students are challenged with realistic goals and given the support they need not to just get the answers right but to be able to use those lessons to solve future problems on their own, everyone comes out on top. I think that as a teacher, it’s my job to support my students through the lessons I give, but also through the various challenges they may face at school, and to partner with them as well as other support systems to help them feel motivated, comfortable, and happy in the classroom.”
Students don’t all learn or behave the same way, which may make it a challenge to have them all in one classroom at the same time. Difficulties with students can look like many different things, from falling grades to disrupting lessons. So interviewers want to know that you’re up to the task of helping students with the varied obstacles they may face.
A good answer delves into figuring out the cause of a student’s behavior, as that’s often the most important step. “When students are disengaged, it’s either because the content’s too challenging, it’s too easy, or there could be some outside-of-school factors,” Findley says.
Your response should show that “you’re meeting the student where they’re at and building on their strengths,” Findley says. It should also emphasize that you’re “collaboratively discussing” solutions with the student rather than ordering them around.
If you have an example story to tell, that’s a great way to state your case. Just make sure your story is well structured to convey the message you want. Consider using the STAR method whenever you’re answering an interview question with a story—i.e., make sure you cover the Situation you found yourself in, the Task you needed to complete, the Action you took, and the Result your action had, in that order.
You could say: “For me, the first step would be to pull them aside and talk about the issue privately. My main questions would get at the root cause of this student’s behavior. Once I know that, I try to work with them to come up with a solution. I used this strategy in my last classroom, where I had a student who couldn’t seem to stay in his seat during lessons and I found out that sitting still too long made him feel confined and nervous. We talked about how his behavior affected the rest of the class, and we agreed that when he was feeling really anxious he could raise his hand and I’d let him take a lap around the classroom, but only when it was appropriate. I also decided to make some of my lessons more active and hands-on so that other students could benefit from getting out of their seats every once in a while.”
Interviewers want to see how you influence students to do what you need them to do. Findley adds that this is an especially important thing to vet for when hiring remote teachers, because motivating others over video requires a lot more creativity than when you’re teaching in person.
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