If you know how to use humor in education, you may have an effective teaching tool that also makes learning more pleasurable for students. It has the potential to provide a deeper sense of meaning to the process of learning and to aid in maintaining the interest of the audience.
Do not make the assertion that you “aren’t being hilarious” when we are having this discussion. If you are willing to put yourself out there and prepare in advance, you should have no problem eliciting laughter from any crowd.
Important Tips on How to Use Humor in Education
- Collect information about the people who will be watching.
What is their age range? Who makes up the majority of the audience—men, women, or both? In other words, are there common themes that they will all be familiar with and appreciate that they all share? What kind of common knowledge will they have? Always keep these factors in mind when determining how to give something to them and what that something should be.
- You should make an effort to incorporate some amusing moments into the presentation you are giving.
Because it is capable of accomplishing two goals at once, topic-oriented comedy is a very effective mode of communication. In addition to this, it will aid the audience in recalling major concepts that were mentioned during the entirety of the presentation.
- If you are going to use humor in education, look around for amusing items, newspaper clippings, far side cartoons, anecdotes, or anything else that may be included in the performance.
It is especially effective if it is relevant to the subject matter that you are now talking about with the people in your audience. Prepare yourself to begin a meeting with one or more of these topics in order to demonstrate that you place equal importance on educating and entertaining your audience. You’ll be the center of attention, and the atmosphere in the room as a whole will seem more upbeat as a result.
- Prepare yourself for the possibility that some of your attempts at comedy will fall flat.
Some of them won’t work, but that can actually offer you an opportunity to be hilarious by remarking on how poorly your effort at comedy was received by other people. If you say anything to the effect of “Wow… that one flopped” or “Ok… back to the drawing board with that joke,” you will provide the audience with another opportunity to laugh, and in the vast majority of cases, you will at the very least receive some smiles from the crowd.
- Make use of impressions, slapstick, puns, words or phrases with multiple meanings, humorous anecdotes, and any other method that you believe would be helpful.
When you forget about trying to be professional, loosen up, take a chance, and simply go with your concept, you’ll find that some of the funniest things you can do will happen naturally. It has been really effective for me every time I’ve used it, which is many hundreds of times.
Read more: Is it good to use Humor in Education?