Describe your experience of teaching a friend or family member.
You should say:
- whom you taught
- when it was
- what subject you taught
and explain how you felt about teaching this friend or family member.
[You will have to talk about the topic for one to two minutes. You have one minute to think about what you are going to say. You can make some notes to help you if you wish.]
Model Answer 1:
Since my childhood, I had developed a tremendous admiration for teaching. I have always felt that the teaching profession is highly rewarding and challenging at the same time. But, I got a first-hand experience of how rewarding or challenging it really was only after I was forced to embark on a mission of formally teaching my little niece.
It was about 5 years ago, and I just started my new job as a Jr. Software Engineer at a small software firm in my country. Of course, I was lucky that my job had given me a nice, personal laptop so that I could work on it at home from time to time except, of course, the problem was my little 8 years old niece (whom I loved so much, by the way) also liked that laptop, and she also wanted to learn to work on a computer. I tried to dissuade her from using my laptop mainly because I never thought of myself as a “good teacher”. But, she was just too stubborn, and I was left with no other choices than teaching her.
So, the computer lesson began, and to my pleasant surprise, I found out that my niece was rather smart in learning basic things like turning on and off a computer, opening a particular software and composing documents. She even learned things like rearranging application windows, drawing pictures, playing games after teaching her only a few times. I also taught her how to protect folders, do some basic maths, send emails and search for anything on the internet apart from giving her some ideas on what a computer is really capable of accomplishing.
Anyway, I felt really good and a bit proud of myself also as I managed to teach my little niece about some complex (supposed to be complex for a child, I thought) computer lessons without much efforts and hassle. In fact, up until those computer lessons, I never thought that I could teach someone with such ease. Besides, it was after these computer lessons that I realized that we should never underestimate the abilities of children which I did previously.
Model Answer 2:
I now realise how difficult it is to be a good teacher who is equally successful in teaching pupils and being their idol. For that dilemma, I always wanted to be in any profession except for teaching. However, life is full of surprises and when I was a sophomore at my university, I had to agree to teach one of my younger cousins, John, for his university admission.
I was terrified of the proposal while John was convinced he would be better prepared with my help. I would like to thank you for the time to let me share my experience of teaching my cousin.
I got admitted to one of the best engineering universities in our country and my major was civil engineering. After John completed his 12th grades, he wanted to get admitted to this very university and thought that I would be a great help. It was 2018 and I was in my third term then. The entrance exam is quite competitive and more than 60 students contest for a single seat.
John’s parents first approached me so that I help their son with his admission test preparation, but I humbly declined their request. However, when my cousin himself talked to me and expressed his belief about how I could make his dream come true, I could not say no to him.
For the next three months or so, I helped him with maths, physics and chemistry. I would say, teaching John was a magnificent experience and this changed my perspective towards the teaching profession. He was a talented and attentive learner and his success in the admission test gave me a sense of fulfilment.
Similar cue card/ candidate task card topics that you should be able to talk about if you can speak about the topic “Describe an experience of teaching your friend or family member“:
1. Describe when you had to do something even though you did not want to.
2. Describe the experience of teaching something to someone.
3. Describe a recent success you have had.
4. Describe a time when you could not say no to someone you like.
5. Describe an event that changed your perspective about something.