Laugh a Little

Have you laughed today?

Research shows that the average 4 year old laughs 300 times a day.

It takes the average 40 year old 2.5 months to laugh that much.

In one poll, when asked about laughing today, the average 23 year old answered 'no.' In fact, across adult age levels the answer did not become 'yes' until age 70-80. 

Our students want to laugh and unfortunately over the span of our lives we have been taught to laugh less. This creates a humor gap.

Studies show that laughing is important to our health. Laughing can be an act of mindfulness.

As you work toward the end of the year and you wrap up learning and present test after test it is important to stop and breath in deep and let out a laugh. Mindful Laughter

You can start a laughter mindfulness by introducing a smiling mindfulness. When we smile and laugh our brain begins releasing endorphins. Endorphins are those fun free happiness chemicals that flood our brains and make up feel good. The act of laughing can also help boost your immune systems by reducing your levels of cortisol. Laughing also releases the chemical oxytocin. The really cool thing is that these chemicals are all released at the same time. This makes your brain feel like it is exercising and meditating all at the same time.

Rates of depression due to the pandemic create an great need for us to step back and take time to laugh. 

Starting a mindful laughter practice can also be a good way to teach your students school appropriate humor. Our students are bombarded with displays of "humor" on the internet, on TV, and in movies. The humor they are presented with is often offensive, hurtful, and inappropriate. I recently spoke with a student who had a friend call her a derogatory name for a female. When confronted with this the girl stated it was a joke. In fact, the girl told others that it was an inside joke. The girl dealing with the name calling told me "how can it be an inside joke when I wasn't in on it?" 

I spoke recently with a classroom on humor in school and shared with the students that we need to be sure our humor does not hurt others. It isn't funny when we make others feel bad. Humor should not hurt. The joke I use as an example is one shared by a third grader a couple of years ago. The joke goes like this "Want to hear a joke?? It's about pizza....*pause*... never mind I can't tell you, it's too cheesy" With this joke I get great laugher, groans, and smiles. After the joke I always ask, was anyone hurt by this joke? 

We need humor. Our students need humor.

School days can seem long. The school year feels unending. And tests....let's not even talk about how those make teachers and students feel.

Have you tried taking time to laugh with your students? 

I remember my high school band director using humor to lighten the mood when we had to play the same thing over and over and over again. He would acknowledge the mundane and make himself the joke "I know, band directors famous last words....one more time..." We can show humor even in the things that have to be done. We had to practice until we knew the music. For marching band it had to be memorized. There is no way around playing the music over and over. To lighten the mood and break the tension, Mr. Anderson would make a joke. We would laugh. And then we got back to playing. 

Your students need to laugh. You need to laugh.

Mindfulness is about being present in the moment. The more we can learn this ability the better attention we can give to life. 

Taking some time to let your students laugh will help them feel happy and wake their brain. You can help them get out the laughter at an appropriate time, thus helping them focus at the right time too.

In a study conducted by researcher Avner Ziv it was found that students who were taught a lesson using humor where better able to recall information. In fact, those students who learned with humor did better on tests, out scoring those who were taught a lesson without humor. 

Today I was introduced to another helpful podcast. Hidden Brain. The episode I picked to listen to was on humor. If you have some time listen to the episode Humor Us.

I hope that you take time this week to find humor and share it with your students. To help get you started I am sharing one funny movie clip and one funny meme. Feel free to comment with something funny to share. Let's explore the mindful benefits of laughter. Humor me ;) 

I Sail There is something just simple and funny about this clip. It is a movie clip my husband and I often reference for a laugh.