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When preparing for an interview for a teaching job, you can predict many of the things that you will be asked. You will almost certainly be asked why you want to work at this particular school, how you would deal with specific behaviour issues and something about responding to 51���� concerns. Everyone knows these questions are coming and can have their answers prepared in such a way as to communicate exactly what they want about themselves.

Another question, though, is becoming increasingly common, and it can sometimes cause people to freeze up: “What piece of educational research has influenced you the most?”

This question is not designed to trip up the applicant. The interviewer is almost certainly genuinely interested. It is a useful way to see if there is alignment in approaches to teaching and learning between the candidate and the school. It also helps to reveal whether the candidate is actively engaged in their own professional development - something that many schools value.

So how should you answer such a question?

Most importantly, your answer should be honest. There is no point in trying to mention something you haven’t actually read and that hasn’t had an impact on you, because the truth will quickly become quickly apparent as soon as you’re asked a follow-up question.

Hopefully, you already have an array of pieces of research from your training or from CPD that you could talk about, and you can therefore consider what each one would say about you at the interview.

Here is a selection of pieces that you might like to keep in mind and what they could tell an interviewer about you.

Education research: what it says about you in an interview

‘I’m prepared for future priorities’

by Robin Alexander (2018)

You would have to be teaching under a rock not to have noticed the increased focus on oracy in recent years. Most schools I work with currently include oracy as a development priority, and many have set up working groups to put in place CPD to help teachers to better support “pupil talk” in the classroom.

However, as Robin Alexander’s work has shown over the years, there is a lot more to oracy than encouraging pupils to talk. This paper focuses on supporting oracy through the use of ”dialogic teaching”. It describes a trial in which teachers were trained to use a wide repertoire of classroom talk techniques that would help pupils to make greater progress in their learning.

It is a useful paper to reference in an interview to show that you understand both the importance of oracy and the complexities of getting it right.

Further reading from Tes: Christine Howe on dialogic teaching

‘I understand the steps needed before pupils can learn independently’

by John Dunlosky (2013)

Teachers and school leaders often talk about their desire to create “independent learners” who can take control of their own education. One of the first tastes that many pupils get of this is when they are asked to revise for tests. However, when left to their own devices, people often revise in very ineffective ways, such as by re-reading or highlighting their notes.

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John Dunlosky’s paper explores different revision methods and the research that shows what is likely and less likely to work. It makes the point that pupils need to be taught how to study before they can do it independently.

Mentioning it in an interview demonstrates that you understand that creating independent learners is a curriculum goal, not a pedagogy.

Further reading from Tes: John Dunlosky on building better learners

‘I know that the principles matter just as much as the practice’

by Jefferey Karpicke and Phillip Grimaldi (2012)

It is rare these days to visit the start of a lesson and not see some form of retrieval practice taking place, usually in the form of a quiz.

Sometimes this quiz is done very well, with well-chosen questions that require pupils to think hard and recall their previous lessons in order to find the answers. However, too often pupils are flicking through their books, looking for obscure pieces of information to transfer to a mini-whiteboard. Or they are sitting there waiting for the answers to be revealed so that they can faithfully transcribe them.

These problems occur because people have been told that retrieval quizzes are helpful (or that they are expected) but have not understood the principles that underpin the practice.

Karpicke and Grimaldi’s paper sets out the research behind retrieval practice and explores how it should create not just rote recall of facts but what they term “meaningful learning”.

In an interview, explaining this will help you to show that you think about the pedagogy you call on in a lesson.

Further reading from Tes: Holly Korbey investigates the limitations of working memory

‘I think deeply about the purpose of the curriculum’

by Michael Young and Johan Muller (2008)

There is a tension in education between two competing philosophies. One states that knowledge is fixed and the role of the teacher is to pass this knowledge from their heads into the heads of their pupils. The second states that knowledge is always subjective and the role of the teacher is to draw out of pupils that which they already know.

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The work of Young and Muller shows the flaws of both of these views of education and proposes a third way (or “future”) that transcends them. This “future 3” approach is based on an understanding that knowledge is not fixed, but that our understanding is always evolving, as old certainties are contested and changed.

It led to Young’s development of the idea of “powerful knowledge”, which leads to pupils being able to better understand the world. It helps to provide a justification for what is taught, as well as how it is taught.

Mentioning this paper at interview can help you to show that you do not take curriculum for granted and that you are aware there is a responsibility on teachers to choose what to teach their pupils.

Further reading from Tes: Michael Young on knowledge and the curriculum

‘I keep up to date with information about my subject’

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One of the many roles of Ofsted’s now-dismantled curriculum unit was to provide the education sector with research reviews into what quality of education looked like in different subjects and then to produce a subject report into the state of education at this point in time.

These subject reports are based on visits to schools up and down the country and they record what was seen there. They provide insights into strong and less strong practice in areas such as decisions over what to teach; what was taught well, and what was sometimes overlooked; how assessment was handled; and what pupils were learning and what they were not. The reports also provide recommendations for improvements.

At a time when teachers may struggle to get out and see what is happening in different schools, these reports provide a useful way for teachers to compare and contrast their own experiences with those of others.

Referring to these subject reports in an interview helps to show that you are aware of wider developments in how your subject is taught and are interested in what goes on beyond your own classroom.

Further reading from Tes: Mike Hobbiss and Paul Cline explore why subjects need their own take on the “cogsci revolution”

Mark Enser is an author and freelance writer. He is a former HMI and was Ofsted’s geography lead

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