The British Council recommends using humor in the classroom to reduce student anxiety and get them to relax so that they feel more comfortable participating in class and taking risks with the language. In a video posted by the British Council, Dale Whitlock discusses several methods of integrating humor into classroom instruction.
A few things that Dale does to inject humor into his classroom:
-discusses his “good looks” with the class
-frequently uses monkeys as the subject of discussion
-makes the correct answer obvious by offering the same (correct) answer multiple times or offer a couple ridiculous choices and one that is clearly the correct choice
Injecting humor into your class can also give your students insight into American culture. What people find funny is often very closely tied to their native culture. As students learn more English, more American humor is accessible to them. While in the video Dale instructs adolescents, humor can prove to be valuable in the adult ESL classroom, as well.
If you’d like to watch the video, click here.
Be warned: Since this is a British video, the humor is dry!
Do you use humor in the classroom? If you do, tell us how it works for you in the comments below.