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I'm a math PhD who has been asked to interview a high school student and determine what he/she is interested in and how strong the student is.

Usually I would want them to talk as much as possible about what classes they've taken and what parts of the classes they like the best. Generally I'd like to allow them to get comfortable talking about what they like rather than what they think I'd like. However, that might not work this time as the student is a non-native english speaker and may get less comfortable as I try to get him/her to talk more.

Thus far I'm thinking about watching how he/she solves different problems in different areas of math, but I would like to know if anyone has done this before or has any suggestions for evaluating a student who might not be comfortable talking much.

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    Dear Curious, would trying to find a mathematically adept translator be impractical?2010-10-17
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    Well it's not as if this person can't speak english. I just know that it can be uncomfortable for non-native speakers to attempt to talk at length. In any case, while it wouldn't be completely impractical to find someone who spoke the language, it would be quite impractical to pawn my work off onto someone else every time I had to deal with a non-native speaker.2010-10-17
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    It is customary to mark soft questions like these as Community Wiki.2010-10-17
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    Although I purportedly have the ability to make posts community wiki, there's no checkbox when I try to edit the post2010-10-17
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    at the bottom on the right you should find the checkbox, otherwise you can request someone else edit it for you and do so.2010-10-17
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    I'm not trying to be snarky here (really!), but: is it so clear how to assess the mathematical ability of a teenager whose native language is English (or whatever yours happens to be)? It's not to me...2010-10-17
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    Don't underestimate the kid. If he has been in an English speaking country for more than 3 or 4 years, expect him to have picked up all the necessary jargon.2010-10-17

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