GABA Interview
I recently attended an interview at GABA. I tried looking online before the interview for what to expect but couldn't find much information on it, so I decided to give some details of the interviews to help those who are thinking about working for GABA. Note that this is for applicants who are already in Japan and not for Overseas applicants.
Information Session and First Interview
I was the only one at my information session so things maybe a little different if there were more people. I was brought into one of their meeting rooms on the 4th floor and the interviewer/presenter gave me some forms to fill in. Then she gave a presentation about GABA which lasted for about 30 mins. After the presentation, she just sighted my documents (passport, ARC, bank account) and asked a few simple questions like why did I come to Japan? Why did you choose to teach English? How long did I intend to stay with GABA. Then she left me to do the Post info session task which is a written exercise.
The first question asked you to do a lesson plan and explain how you would teach LISTEN and HEAR to a beginner student.
The second question was writing the different conjugations of TEACH (past, present, future, continuous, perfect).
The third question was teaching an intermediate level student agreeing and disagreeing. The student is someone that sells home entertainment system to clients in the US so it's best to tailor the lesson to the students profile.
The fourth section is on idioms. Most were pretty simple.
The last question was just for creativity purposes, asking who you would like as an English teacher and why.
That concludes the first interview.
Second Interview
The second interview is more formal. This time I was brought up to the eighth floor where they had several small booths inside a room and we sat down in one of the booths. My interviewer was really friendly. Below were the questions she asked me.
Tell me a bit about yourself and what brought you to Japan
Why did you want to teach English?
Why did you choose GABA?
Are there any concerns you have regarding GABA?
What type of students do you think you will be able to attract?
After that we went through the post info session task which I completed at the first interview. She asked me to actually demonstrate my lesson of teaching HEAR and LISTEN as written in my lesson plan. After my demonstration, she asked me what I thought about it and how I think I would improve on it and she also gave me feedback on the good and bad of my demo.
For the second question, again she asked me about my thoughts on the task.
For the third question, she just asked me to talk her through how I will go about teaching the lesson. It was kind of difficult and I don't think I did a good demonstration of it.
For the idioms questions she just asked me what type of clients would want to learn idioms.
After going through the written task I had to do the actual real demo lesson. I was given 5 minutes to prepare a 10 minute demo lesson. The interviewer will be acting as the student. I was given a page from one of their textbooks and it was for a beginner student. The lesson related to words such as always, often, never, occasionally etc. There are actually a few activities in the textbook so make sure you use them. Once the student has grasped the concept of how to use the words, you can challenge them a little more by asking other questions. Remember to use simple language and talk slowly and clearly.
Information Session and First Interview
I was the only one at my information session so things maybe a little different if there were more people. I was brought into one of their meeting rooms on the 4th floor and the interviewer/presenter gave me some forms to fill in. Then she gave a presentation about GABA which lasted for about 30 mins. After the presentation, she just sighted my documents (passport, ARC, bank account) and asked a few simple questions like why did I come to Japan? Why did you choose to teach English? How long did I intend to stay with GABA. Then she left me to do the Post info session task which is a written exercise.
The first question asked you to do a lesson plan and explain how you would teach LISTEN and HEAR to a beginner student.
The second question was writing the different conjugations of TEACH (past, present, future, continuous, perfect).
The third question was teaching an intermediate level student agreeing and disagreeing. The student is someone that sells home entertainment system to clients in the US so it's best to tailor the lesson to the students profile.
The fourth section is on idioms. Most were pretty simple.
The last question was just for creativity purposes, asking who you would like as an English teacher and why.
That concludes the first interview.
Second Interview
The second interview is more formal. This time I was brought up to the eighth floor where they had several small booths inside a room and we sat down in one of the booths. My interviewer was really friendly. Below were the questions she asked me.
Tell me a bit about yourself and what brought you to Japan
Why did you want to teach English?
Why did you choose GABA?
Are there any concerns you have regarding GABA?
What type of students do you think you will be able to attract?
After that we went through the post info session task which I completed at the first interview. She asked me to actually demonstrate my lesson of teaching HEAR and LISTEN as written in my lesson plan. After my demonstration, she asked me what I thought about it and how I think I would improve on it and she also gave me feedback on the good and bad of my demo.
For the second question, again she asked me about my thoughts on the task.
For the third question, she just asked me to talk her through how I will go about teaching the lesson. It was kind of difficult and I don't think I did a good demonstration of it.
For the idioms questions she just asked me what type of clients would want to learn idioms.
After going through the written task I had to do the actual real demo lesson. I was given 5 minutes to prepare a 10 minute demo lesson. The interviewer will be acting as the student. I was given a page from one of their textbooks and it was for a beginner student. The lesson related to words such as always, often, never, occasionally etc. There are actually a few activities in the textbook so make sure you use them. Once the student has grasped the concept of how to use the words, you can challenge them a little more by asking other questions. Remember to use simple language and talk slowly and clearly.