In this lesson you are participating in the real preparation work behind an interview. A strong interview rarely starts with the first question in the room. It starts with research you can actually use, answers you have practised out loud, and two or three questions that show you understand the role.

You will study one strong prep sheet, then build your own for a realistic role you could face after school.

Before you move on: name one realistic role (part-time job, apprenticeship, FET or HE interview, or a placement follow-up that feels like one) and confirm you have one saved source ready (job advert or organisation page from earlier Strand 2.2 work, or one you open now). You will write against that role for the rest of the lesson.

These three terms shape how you prepare. Read them once, then keep them in mind when you study Aoife's prep sheet and write your own.

Other formats you may meet: group interview (several candidates together on a shared task) and virtual interview (video call: camera height, quiet space, looking at the lens when you speak).

First, walk through Aoife's interview prep sheet. It is for a realistic front-of-house trainee role (composite Irish hotel example for class use). Notice what she researched, how specific her three draft answers are, and what she plans to ask them.

Then, in your Strand 2.2 folder in the Digital Portfolio, create or open a document called Interview Prep[Role] (for example Interview Prep Retail Assistant or Interview Prep Apprenticeship). Use a notes or word-processing doc. If the file is blank, add these headings and fill them in for the role you named at the start of the lesson:

• Role research: what the organisation does, what the role involves day to day, and one fact that only someone who looked it up would know (lifted from your saved advert or organisation page)
• Expected format: one-to-one, panel, group or virtual, and one presentation habit that format needs
• Three expected questions with a draft answer for each (use a real example from school, work, sport, volunteering or home; keep each answer under a minute spoken: situation, what you did, what happened)
• Questions I will ask them: two or three questions that show you understand the work, not just the pay

Digital Portfolio hand-off: save Interview Prep[Role] in Strand 2.2. It shows usable research, a named format habit, three evidenced draft answers and candidate questions. You will use this sheet in next lesson's mock interview, and it can feed Portfolio in Action evidence for interview preparation.

This prep sheet is the artefact you take into next lesson's mock interview practice.

Talk these through with the person beside you, then update your prep sheet before next lesson.

• Pick one draft answer on your sheet. If you said it out loud in sixty seconds, what would you cut first, and what detail would you keep no matter what?
• Effective personal presentation is not the same as being the loudest person in the room. For the format you named on your sheet, what is one habit that would make you clearer without making you fake?

Required portfolio annotation: under a heading Prep notes on Interview Prep[Role], add two lines: (1) the cut you will make to one draft answer, and (2) the presentation habit you will practise for your named format. Save the file again in Strand 2.2 so the annotation sits with the sheet you will use in the mock interview and can feed Portfolio in Action evidence.

Today you practised the preparation side of the interview process and left with a real prep sheet in your Digital Portfolio.

• Common interview formats: one-to-one, panel, group and virtual, and why format changes how you present yourself
• Personal presentation as clarity, listening and evidenced answers, not a polished act
• How to prepare: usable research, three draft answers built on real examples, and questions worth asking them
• Your Interview Prep[Role] document in Strand 2.2, with Prep notes, ready for mock interview practice next lesson and usable for Portfolio in Action evidence