It’s my first time doing demo lesson for an interview. I was asked to introduce myself and introduce my country. Time limit is 5 minutes. I can choose either kindergarten kids, elementary, junior high, or high school students as my target audience.
My plan is to use visual aids while I’m talking and also ask the students a few questions along the way so the lesson dont seem too one-sided.
I’m pretty introverted so I’m rather nervous.. Any tips is much appreciated! Thank you in advance.
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If the interview’s going to be in person, remember to project your voice—imagine you’re talking to someone 4 or 5 meters away—but use your normal intonation.
Tips on subject matter or tips on presentation skills?
I made some papers with paw prints of animals from my state (Oregon) on one side and nice big pictures of the animals themselves on the other side. Who is this? He is very big/small/cute. He likes to eat fish/grass/wood. He says _sounds_. Bear, deer, cougar etc. The last one was a beaver and then I revealed my state flag. BOEs always ate it up.
Five minutes is really short though.
Five minutes is very short, but can feel like a very long time! General warning.Since it’s a “lesson,” think of what you can teach in that time. If you want to keep it simple, something like “two truths and a lie” is always fun.”Australia has kangaroos, buffalo, and dingos!”And then you can teach “has / doesn’t have” while introducing your country. You could also do it with “be” – “Canada is cold, north, and small” teaching is/isn’t.This is good for any age level, though best for Junior High Grade 1 and lower.
Take kinder, do some flash card drills, a memory game, and be spazzy. Silly voices and unrealistic levels of enthusiasm.
Cards: back to front (so you can see what’s next lol), listen and repeat, then go one more time with the students saying. Big praise.
Memory: lay the cards out face up. Check comprehension/drill difficult ones. make a silly rhyme, ‘1, 2, 345, everybody close your eyes!’ Big gestures to close eyes. Flip one card face down. ‘Ok! <Comprehension check until face down card> Oh no! What’s this?’ When answered, flip over again.
Lots of gestures, big silly voice, use rhythm a lot when drilling the vocab/sentences.
Done. 👍
Show a big map of Japan and ask, what’s this? Smart kids yell Nihon Nippon etc. Say great, good job. In English it’s Japan. Can you say Japan? Then show map of your country. Ask what’s this? Kids yell AMERICA! Correct them if necessary. Show Japanese food, animals etc then juxtapose with those of your country in the same way as the map activity.
Key point is to keep asking questions and try to never say ‘no’ or ‘wrong’ directly.
Is this for an ALT position or eikaiwa?
If it’s for an ALT position, keep in mind that the level you “teach” may help determine where you are placed. Teach the level you’d like to go to, if you have an idea of what that is.
For my last job I was also requested to do a demo (15 minutes!) during the interview. I’m also an introvert who easily gets nervous. I definitely was during the demo. Afterwards I received feedback that I came across as humble, apparently as opposed to teachers who are overly confident, and ultimately that’s why they decided to hire me. So you never know, they might not necessarily be looking for the stereotypical extrovert gaijin.
I had to do a demo lesson and i have never had any teaching experience before.
BUT i do know how to use powerpoint. So i created a powerpoint presentation in which i read a story out loud just as i would to my daughter. Each slide showed a story page. Then i had some slides with directions – Up, down, left, right, go forward, turn left, etc.
Plug in a computer to a TV and have that as your background – point to the TV when needed and just read what the powerpoint slides say.
Not much memorizing and its all guided via the slides.
Turns out that once i got to Japan, all classrooms i have taught in have 65-70 inch TVs and laptops that i could use for powerpoint. Only use the blackboards for some things. Everything else – POWERPOINT!