Thinking Skills Assessment, 1 interview
Questions related to pre-read sources on economics and political philosophy
Practised discussing PPE-related issues; Completed practice interviews; Kept up with current affairs
Completed practice and past papers under exam conditions
Definitely practice vocalising your ideas and thought processes - it's really important for interviewers to understand why you're thinking something
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:
Number of interviews: 1
Length of interviews: 25 minutes
Online interview: Yes
I was given two passages with questions underneath, and I had 65 mins to read and answer the questions.
I felt fairly relaxed going into it, because I already had the questions and knew what to expect, and the interviewers were all friendly and not intimidating at all! the first passage was related to protests and political philosophy -- it was written by one of the interviewers -- and the second passage was economics/game theory, with a bit of simple maths (mostly algebra).
We discussed my answers to the questions, and they extended some of my answers with follow-up questions. Generally had a good experience, despite being a bit nervous, and they were very understanding even when I made some silly maths errors (which I quickly rectified). I think
I founded a PPE club where we would have safe open discussions about various PPE-related topics, which really helped me to explore potential ideas that could come up in interviews, as well as practice effectively communicating my thought processes out loud.
I also
Other general preparation included reading books, keeping up with current events, etc.
I did all the practice papers and past papers I could find and made a spreadsheet to note down which questions I got wrong, and the "type" of question (e.g. finding the main conclusion, maths, etc.). From there I could see which questions I tended to struggle with, and I could assess which questions I should allocate more time to vs. questions I might skip and go back to.
For the essay section, I practised answering the questions under exam conditions and then spent an extra 30 minutes researching + adding to my essay (I found this useful to help with general knowledge and as interview prep).
Definitely practice vocalising your ideas and thought processes (talk with friends, teachers or fam, join a club) -- it's really important for them to understand why you're thinking something because they don't necessarily expect us to know the "correct" answer. I thought I really screwed up because I made a silly mistake on a maths problem, but it turned out to be fine because they gave me a shot to correct myself.
I didn't expect to get the questions and passages in advance, and as a more visual person, I'll admit that this gave me an advantage, but from what I've heard, different colleges have completely different types of interviews, so that's really down to luck. It would be good to prepare for passage-type interviews as well as "normal" interviews just in case!
But, to be honest, the best preparation is to be genuinely interested in your subject(s) because you'll end up doing most of the preparation as you explore topics that interest you (e.g. I was really interested in game theory and listened to some podcasts on it just for fun, and it ended up in the interview!).