Now comes time for many high schools to deal with their needs for new teachers in various disciplines. I was honored to be invited by my alma mater to be one of the three judges for phase two—teaching demonstration. They need two new English teachers for the coming school year.

Today I got up early, giving myself enough time for breakfast and then arriving at the school in time for the 8:10 coordination meeting before my work officially started at 8:40. After nearly 5 and a half hours of demonstrations and Q & A sessions, my job was done.

In the demonstration, each of the ten candidates gave a 15-minute teaching demonstration of a lesson chosen secretly, which they were given for preparation a short time before they presented themselves in front of us three judges, made up of two school teachers and one retiree. Each tried their utmost best to convince us that they were proficient in teaching the language. Then came the 5-minute session of Q & A, where they had to answer at least 3 questions from the three judges. According to their teaching and how satisfying their answers were, the judges gave a score.

I had done my homework as a judge. I constructed some questions that I thought could be used for that matter, which are subject to modifications. I write them down here for future candidates’ reference.

u        Please elaborate on why you were doing what you were doing as you were teaching such and such.

u        How would you make a good first impression on your students in the very first class at the start of a new semester, convincing them that you are a competent teacher that they can learn a lot from?

u        How would you deal with students who take no interest in English?

u        How do you feel about your demonstration just now? Given a second time and longer time, would you do it differently? How?