2x interviews
Both interviews: general questions, discussion of pre-reading, responding to resources
Reviewing personal statement, conversations with teachers, reviewing Geography coursework
N/A
Try to embrace the experience!
Remember this advice isn't official. There is no guarantee it will reflect your experience because university applications can change between years. Check the official Cambridge and Oxford websites for more accurate information on this year's application format and the required tests.
Also, someone else's experience may not reflect your own. Most interviews are more like conversations than tests and like, any conversation, they are quite interactive.
Test taken: None
Number of interviews: 2
Time between interviews: 2 hours
Length of interviews: 45 minutes
Online interview: Yes
The interviews didn't appear to have any theme. Both interviews involved pre-reading, which I was sent about 30 minutes before. I would advise being able to print this off, completing it in school may be easier for this, as annotating the pre-reading was useful. Both interviews started with a reassuring and kind introduction by the interviewers. This was very nice as it put me at ease and enabled me to relax somewhat. Then there were a couple of questions about why I chose the subject, followed by questions on the pre-reading. In one interview I was shown another resource and then in both I was given an opportunity to ask questions. At all times it felt more like a conversation than an interview and I was getting good responses from the interviewers. It didn't feel like a one way conversation at all.
I re-read my personal statement. This reminded me of the key points I'd made and helped me think about topics that I'd discussed and were likely to come up. It also helped me to remind myself of my own passion for the subject. This was useful as a starting point and a good basis as to questions directly about your personal statement. I don't remember any direct questions about the statement as such but I was able to bring up some themes that I'd spoken about.
Also, I re-read any texts referenced in the personal statement, or summaries of such. This helped to remind me of the key themes which I could be asked about. This wasn't as useful as I expected because it felt like I was able to direct the flow of the interview more than I expected. I brought up a few topics related to books I'd read and talked about in my personal statement but due to the broad nature of the subject, the questions weren't specific to the texts.
I was writing my NEA at the time. This was surprisingly really useful. If you do Geography A level and you have completed your NEA by the time the interviews come around consider re-reading or thinking about the topic. When I brought this up in the interview, there were many follow-up questions. This was nice because I was passionate about my NEA and thus answers came more easily and this made me a lot more relaxed!
My advice would be to ask questions if you're stuck - I did this and not only was the interviewer really nice about it, but it also gave me more time to think of a response. And as much as this is really hard, try to embrace the experience, this is an opportunity to interact with some of the best academics in their field!