Last Updated on October 4, 2023 by Editorial Team
Interviews often require students to think on their feet. They must listen carefully and react and reply appropriately to the questions they are asked. They put their metacognitive skill to work by planning how to crack the interview.
Mock interviews and recruitment training can prove to be essential tools in preparing children for their future job interviews and placements. The younger the children start, the more confident they become as they mature into adults. These mock interviews and recruitment training can inculcate the confidence, and experience required for actual interview scenarios.
This post will discuss a few interview activity ideas for high schoolers that have the potential to help them put their metacognitive skills to work.
Interview activity ideas for high school students
Below is a detailed list of exciting interview activity ideas that can be conducted within classroom premises. Read on to know more!
1. The ‘tell me about yourself’ activity
One of the commonly asked questions in interviews is ‘tell me about yourself.’ As simple as it sounds, the ‘tell me about yourself’ activity is all about asking students to describe themselves.
Here is what you will need:
- Sheets of paper for each student
Here is how to conduct the activity
- Give a sheet of paper to each student and ask them to write a paragraph on themselves. They can include a short intro, their background, their strengths, and their weaknesses.
- The catch here is that their answer needs to be relevant to what a company would look for.
- To make it challenging, you can set the time for the activity. Students must hand over their sheets to you within that time frame.
- Next, hand over another sheet of paper to each student and ask them to list out some points that answer the question ‘Why should your dream company hire you?’
- To make it more challenging, you can ask them to draw points from the first paragraph that they have written about themselves.
- Once the handover is done, evaluate all the sheets and read out some of the best ones to the entire class.
Takeaways from the activity
- ‘Tell me about yourself’ is an activity that can help students understand the different qualities that an individual must possess to land a job.
- When you read out some of the best paragraphs, you give the rest of the students an idea of what they may or may not have missed.
- Since the activity is timed, students can use it as an opportunity to improve their writing skills.
Skills acquired:
Written communication practice, self-expressiveness, self-insightfulness.
2. Creativity Punch
‘Creativity Punch’ puts the creative side of the brain to work. Students need to come up with unconventional and unusual ways to justify their stand.
Here is what you will need:
- A list of objects that find use in an office.
Here is how to conduct the activity
- Assign any one object from the aforementioned list to each student or to a group of students.
- Then, ask the student or the group to come up with around 15-20 unconventional uses of the object.
- Once done, the student(s) need(s) to present the object and its uses to the entire class. They must also justify how the object is used unconventionally.
- To make it more challenging, you can time the event.
Takeaways from the activity
- This activity can be helpful in helping students put the creative side of the brain at play and answer questions that are tricky and a bit unconventional.
- Moreover, since students have to justify unconventionality, they get a chance to improve their reasoning ability.
Skills acquired:
Critical reasoning, imaginative skills
3. Listen up
‘Listen Up’ proves to be a good chance for students to work on their listening skills. Interviews require students to listen carefully and respond accordingly.
Here is how it is played:
- Divide students into pairs. Student A begins by stating any random sentence such as, ‘I like playing Chess.’ Student B needs to begin a sentence with the word that ends with student A’s statement. In this case, student B can say something along the lines of ‘Chess is a great activity that I enjoy playing during my free time.’ Student A needs to speak a sentence that starts with the word ‘time’ The activity proceeds similarly.
- You can limit this activity by setting a time.
Takeaways from the activity:
- With this activity, students can brush up on their concentration ability.
- It also provides an opportunity to improve listening skills, which are essential to crack interviews.
Skills acquired:
Active listening, improvised concentration ability
4. Powerpoint Pitch
‘Powerpoint Pitch’ is a fun group-based activity that allows students to come up with ideas for products they would want to develop. The ideas can also include fictional objects because the main motive here is to help students improve their communication skills, and presentation skills, and ensure active participation.
Here is how it is played:
- Divide students into groups of four or five. Ask them to come up with topics of their choice and make PowerPoint presentations on the same.
- You can set some boundary conditions such as:
- Must include headings and sub-headings in the PowerPoint presentations.
- The minimum number of slides.
- Time limit
- A Q and A session at the end of each presentation.
Takeaways from the activity:
- With this activity, you can assess the creativity and communication skills of the students, which are likely essential in job roles that require them to address other people.
- You can also help children overcome stage fear.
Skills acquired:
Self-confidence, presentation skills, interpersonal relationships.
5. Who is your spirit animal?
‘Who is your spirit animal?’ is a fun activity that asks students to reflect on their inner selves. They get a chance to speak of their strengths and other positive qualities.
Here is how it is played:
- Ask the students to talk about their favorite animal for about 3-4 minutes.
- The catch here is that they need to speak of the qualities of their favorite animal that they resonate with the most.
- It is important to ensure that they speak of facts that have a positive impact on the workplace.
Takeaways from this activity:
- Students will speak of all the positive qualities that their favorite animal possesses and are also relevant in the workspace. Therefore, they can easily answer questions like
- Tell me your strengths.
- Why should we hire you?
Skills acquired:
Self-introspection, oratory skills
Summing up
One of the purposes of conducting an interview is to determine if the candidate is suitable for the company. Interviewers ask a wide range of questions – some commonly asked, while the other, unusual questions require students to spend some time thinking. Our list of fun interview activity ideas comprises five games that can help students brush up their skills to face commonly asked questions as well as unusual ones.
I am Shweta Sharma. I am a final year Masters student of Clinical Psychology and have been working closely in the field of psycho-education and child development. I have served in various organisations and NGOs with the purpose of helping children with disabilities learn and adapt better to both, academic and social challenges. I am keen on writing about learning difficulties, the science behind them and potential strategies to deal with them. My areas of expertise include putting forward the cognitive and behavioural aspects of disabilities for better awareness, as well as efficient intervention. Follow me on LinkedIn