Funny Questions to Ask Teachers
Twenty light questions to ask a teacher at a staff lunch, in a student interview or on a school podcast: the best homework excuse, the question that stopped them mid-lesson, the object they will not let anyone borrow, and the lesson that collapsed in ten minutes.
The questions
Open any question for the note
What's the best excuse a student has ever given you for missing homework?
Why ask it
This is the safest possible opener because the joke is on a student nobody will name, and every teacher has one ready. If they tell it well, you know the interview will go fine.
What's a question a student has asked that completely stopped you?
Why ask it
Teachers remember the moments they had no answer far more clearly than the ones they did. The best examples are questions that were entirely reasonable, which is what made them impossible.
What's the strangest thing you've had to confiscate?
Why ask it
Objects date the story and give you a punchline without needing any commentary. Ask what happened to the item afterwards, because a surprising number are still in a drawer.
What's the most confidently wrong answer you've ever marked?
Why ask it
The humour here is about certainty rather than ability, which keeps it affectionate. Teachers who care about this distinction will make it for you unprompted, which tells you something about them.
If you could teach a subject that doesn't exist yet, what would it be?
Why ask it
Most teachers have a real answer to this and have thought about it more than you expect. Listen for whether the subject is something they wish they had been taught themselves.
What's the sentence you have to say every single day that you're sick of?
Why ask it
This gets the truth faster than any question about frustrations, because it is specific and small. Expect something about coats, phones, dates on the page, or putting hands down.
What's the funniest thing that's happened at a parents' evening?
Why ask it
These stories are usually about logistics and mistaken identity rather than about anyone's child, which is what makes them tellable. Keep it away from anything a parent said about their own child.
What do students believe about you that's completely wrong?
Why ask it
Teachers enjoy this one because they get to correct the record on something harmless. The answers are often about their age, their car, or whether they live at the school.
What's the classroom object you're irrationally protective of?
Why ask it
Everyone has a stapler, a mug, or a specific pair of scissors, and the protectiveness is always disproportionate. It is a small human detail that makes a profile or a video feel real.
What's the worst display board you've ever put up?
Why ask it
Self-deprecation about the parts of the job nobody trained them for comes easily, which makes this a good mid-set reset. Photographs frequently exist.
If your teaching style were a type of weather, what would it be?
Why ask it
A metaphor with a limited set of options forces a real choice rather than a paragraph of description. Anyone who answers with sunshine is dodging, so ask what their classes would say instead.
What's the funniest thing a student has written in an essay?
Why ask it
Written answers can be quoted exactly, which is why these are the stories teachers can actually retell without paraphrasing. Ask for the wording rather than the gist.
Which famous person would be a genuinely terrible substitute for your class?
Why ask it
Inverting the usual dream-guest question gets a much more specific answer, because it makes them think about what the job actually requires. The reasoning is the interesting part.
What's a rule you enforce that you privately think is a bit silly?
Why ask it
This can be gently funny or genuinely revealing, so read the room before you ask it. If they are on the record for the school, expect a diplomatic answer and let them have it.
What's the strangest thing you've done to get a class's attention that actually worked?
Why ask it
The condition that it worked is what stops this being a list of gimmicks. The answers are usually quieter than you would guess: standing still, whispering, or writing one word on the board.
What's the most ambitious lesson you've planned that fell apart in ten minutes?
Why ask it
Failure stories are the ones other teachers actually want to hear, and they build more trust than a success would. Ask what they salvaged, because that part is usually the best bit.
What's your least glamorous skill as a teacher?
Why ask it
This produces answers no one puts in a job application: names, timing, handwriting upside down, spotting a phone at thirty paces. It is a better version of the superpower question because it is true.
What would your students say your catchphrase is, and would they be right?
Why ask it
Teachers usually know exactly what it is and have a complicated feeling about it. If they say they do not have one, they do, and any student nearby will supply it.
If there were an awards evening for teachers with honest categories, which would you win?
Why ask it
Invented categories get you a self-assessment that a direct question never would. Ask for the acceptance speech and you have your closing line.
What's a story from your first year of teaching that you now tell as a warning?
Why ask it
This closes with something they have already chosen to be funny about, so it is safe as well as good material. New teachers get more out of the answer than anyone else in the room.
Interviewing a teacher without getting the safe answers
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Timing and setting
Not in the ten minutes before a lesson
A teacher between classes is thinking about the next room. Twenty minutes at lunch, a free period, or the end of the day gets you the version who can actually finish a story.
Say who is going to hear this
A staffroom chat, a student newspaper, and the school's social media are three different conversations. Teachers calibrate hard to the audience, and finding out afterwards that it was on the record ends the goodwill.
Start with the excuse question
Open with something where the joke is safely at a distance from anyone present. Once one story has landed well, the more self-deprecating questions get real answers.
What to leave out
Anything about an identifiable student
Funny stories are fine with the details filed off and unusable with a name, a year group, or enough context to work it out. If a story cannot survive that, drop it.
Pay, management, and inspections
These are real subjects and none of them belong in a light interview. Raising them turns the conversation guarded for everything that follows.
Asking them to rank their classes
Favourite class, worst class, best year group: there is no version of this a teacher can answer honestly on the record. Ask about a moment rather than a ranking.
Publishing before they have seen it
Show a teacher the quotes before they appear anywhere the parents will read them. It costs one email and it is the difference between being invited back and not.
Follow-ups that get the detail
- What were the exact words?
- What did you do in the three seconds after that?
- Do you still have it?
- Has that changed how you run the room now?