{"id":5985,"date":"2020-12-29T08:00:13","date_gmt":"2020-12-29T13:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/braindevs.net\/blog\/blog\/?p=5985"},"modified":"2021-01-15T21:02:08","modified_gmt":"2021-01-16T02:02:08","slug":"why-be-funny-or-what-motivates-teachers-to-be-jokey-in-class","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/why-be-funny-or-what-motivates-teachers-to-be-jokey-in-class\/","title":{"rendered":"Seriously: What Motivates Teachers to Be Funny?"},"content":{"rendered":"

To start 2021 in the right spirit, let’s think about humor in the classroom<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

It seems that, obviously, humor might be a good classroom strategy. When the lesson slows down, a joke or two might brighten the mood.<\/p>\n

Once we begin studying this question the way researchers study things, well, it gets much more complicated. (I once heard the claim that “laughter improves learning 44%!” Unsurprisingly, so vague a statement doesn’t hold up to much scrutiny. For starters, the cited research says 28%, not 44%…)<\/p>\n

We might study, for instance:<\/p>\n

What kind of humor<\/strong> do teachers use?<\/p>\n

Are there differences between K-12 teachers’<\/strong> and college professors’<\/strong> use of humor?<\/p>\n

Are there gender differences<\/strong> in use of humor? (Believe it or not, there’s a controversy here.)<\/p>\n

What motivates<\/strong> teachers to attempt humor?<\/p>\n

I’ve recently found research trying to answer this question:<\/p>\n

What motivation traits<\/em> prompt college<\/em> professors to try content-relevant<\/em> humor? (“Content relevant” means they’re not just telling jokes; they’re being funny about the topic they’re discussing.)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What did the researchers find<\/a>?<\/p>\n

Kinds of Motivation<\/h2>\n

Psychologists often divide behavior up into plausible categories for analysis.<\/p>\n

For instance, if you know Carol Dweck’s work on mindset, you know that some people feel motivated to learn more<\/em>, while others feel motivated to demonstrate what they already know<\/em>.<\/p>\n

In this case, college professors might want to improve at professing<\/em>, or they might want to demonstrate that they’re already top-notch professors<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Also, motivations can be either positive or negative.<\/p>\n

In this case, a professor might want to demonstrate that they’re good<\/em> (positive), or not<\/strong> reveal<\/strong> that they’re bad<\/em> (negative).<\/p>\n

Researchers have other motivational categories as well.<\/p>\n

In this study, they wonder if professors use humor to improve relationships<\/em> with students.<\/p>\n

And, they wonder if a prof’s desire to avoid work<\/em> influences their use of humor.<\/p>\n

To start answering these questions, the researchers had more than 250 professors fill out surveys that give insight into their motivation. (Important: these data, in other words, come from\u00a0self report<\/em>. Not everyone is persuaded by such data.)<\/p>\n

They also asked students to rate — on a scale of 1 to 5 — their agreement with this statement: “Instructor enhances presentations with the use of humor.”<\/p>\n

The Envelope, Please<\/h2>\n

So, what did they learn?<\/p>\n

For instance: when did students endorse the statement that their professor “enhances presentations with the use of humor?”<\/p>\n

Answer: when those professors themselves said s\/he wanted to “build amicable and valued relationships with students.” That is: profs with relational goals<\/strong> use humor to build those relationships.<\/p>\n

How about the reverse? When did students consistently reject that statement?<\/p>\n

Answer: When their professors said they wanted to avoid looking bad. (If you’re keeping score, that’s a “negative performance<\/strong>” goal.)<\/p>\n

In brief: professors who want to connect with students<\/em> make content-related jokes. Those who fear looking incompetent<\/em> remain humorless.<\/p>\n

Three Interesting Points<\/h2>\n

First<\/strong>: the researchers here are scrupulous<\/em> to distinguish between college professors and K-12 teachers. They don’t claim that these findings apply to earlier grades.<\/p>\n

Second<\/strong>: This research team — contradicting others — finds that women use humor more often than men. (The controversy continues!)<\/p>\n

Third<\/strong>: One word in particular jumps out at me: “enhances.” Students didn’t say that the professors “tried” to be funny, but that they “enhanced presentations with humor.”<\/p>\n

That is: the students suggest that — for teachers who want to build relationships — humor really does make lectures better<\/em>. The researchers don’t address that question directly, but — at least to me — that conclusion flows directly from this research.<\/p>\n

Oh, what the heck. Let’s have another.<\/p>\n

Fourth<\/strong>: In humor as in all things, personality matters<\/em>. If you’re not a funny teacher, don’t feel that you have to start telling jokes to build relationships. You — almost certainly — have your own ways to do so. Use your own authentic strategies to connect with your students.<\/p>\n

I can’t cite research, but I’m almost certain: your own honest self-presentation will be MUCH more effective at building relationships that forced humor.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To start 2021 in the right spirit, let’s think about humor in the classroom. It seems that, obviously, humor might be a good classroom strategy. When the lesson slows down, a joke or two might brighten the mood. Once we begin studying this question the way researchers study things, well, it gets much more complicated. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":5988,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[15,16],"class_list":["post-5985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lb-blog","tag-classroom-advice","tag-college"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5985"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5985\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6012,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5985\/revisions\/6012"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.braindevs.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}