WHEN TO MAKE THE CLASS LAUGH

Evening Star, Issue 18254, 19 April 1923, Page 12

WHEN TO MAKE THE CLASS LAUGH

THE LIGHTER SIDE. Anyone who has ever taught knows how quick a class is to respond to any incitement to laughter. An uproar is one of their delights; and the teacher usually has to guard himself against a fatuous belief in his own wit; since the response he is often served with far outruns his deserts. Yet the value of laughter as an aid to teaching is not often dwelt upon bv pedagogues. An “Evening Instructor 1 ’ in the employ of the London County Council declares that laughter, “ assuming naturally that the laugh is with and not against the teacher,” acts as a "kind of lubricant which enables the machinery of the mind to run more smoothly,” and also indicates that " the teacher and his class are en rapport.’’ In the London ‘ Daily Herald ’ ho tells us how it works:

“ Particularly is this noticeable with mixed classes of evening students who are occupied during the day time, and it may not be too much to infer that the introduction of laughter into ordinary lectures and classes would do something to dispel tho blight which seems to have attacked education in this country. Tho essence of teaching is the teacher, but the majority of our experts in education seem to think that it is the system. The result is that many teachers start handicapped

by a belief in some pompous and solemn routine in which, so they have been led to believe, the secret of success must lie. Consequently, overpowered - with the seriousness of their work, they endeavor to maintain a grave demeanor, and consider that this gravity is a sine qua non in their profession. “ The teacher should really adapt himself to the needs of his class, and should not expect to force his class on to bis own high level of intelligence. Laughter is the best means of adaptation. An occasional play upon words, and striking and unusual illustration, and pieces of humorous censure —all these little points serve _to arouse the interest and rivet the attention of the class. “It must not be inferred that the teacher should endeavor to become a kind of private buffoon; so many people strain after the gnat of originality and swallow the camel of eccentricity. But if official teachers, whoso existence does not necessarily depend on their competence in their profession, would consider the case of the man with whom success is everything, they might pick up some valuable hints in teaching. “ The crammer (to take as an example a despised profession), if he is successful, must at least be able to teach, and anyone who happens to be present at a class taken by a good crammer cannot fail to notice that laughter is the chief ingredient in his success. He will invariably discourse in a semi-humorous vein; he will take far-fetched illustrations; he will employ peculiar turns of phrase. All this sticks in the memory. “ Teachers and lecturers, particularly the latter, who read their lectures persistently, should realise that a slavish subservience to routine is not teaching, and that, curiously enough, the lighter touch penetrates far more deeply into the students’ mind than the lugubrious efforts of the conventional pedagogue.”