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Using Humor in Virtual Classroom: Lecturer’s Perspective
Last modified: 2020-11-23
Abstract
The pandemic of Covid-19 hits many aspects including the way of teaching that has
transformed into online by using virtual classroom provided by some platforms. This study
identifies lecturers’ perspective towards humor incorporation in virtual classroom. A closeended questionnaire comprises 15 questions was distributed online by using Google Form to
33 participants from 5 universities in North Sumatera, Indonesia. The questions covers three
categories namely humor incorporation in learning process, humor and its effect to students,
and humor material used by lecturer. The questionnaire was formatted by using Likert scale.
The data were processed and analyzed statistically by using SPSS. More detailed answer was
obtained by interviewing the participant who was selected randomly based on their consent.
The findings reveal that lecturers dominantly believe that humor incorporation in classroom
is important, and it can be used as teaching strategy. The other point is they also believe that
humor incorporation during teaching-learning process can trigger students’ interaction,
enthusiasm, comfort, and motivation as well as lecturers can get respect and positive attitude.
Regarding the material or topic used in performing humor, the lecturers believe that sensitive
thing (pornography, religion, sexuality, and political choice), students’ cultural background,
and lesson learned at that time must be considered. Therefore, it can be suggested that humor
incorporation can be considered as an alternative to kill the pressure and boredom during
online learning session.
transformed into online by using virtual classroom provided by some platforms. This study
identifies lecturers’ perspective towards humor incorporation in virtual classroom. A closeended questionnaire comprises 15 questions was distributed online by using Google Form to
33 participants from 5 universities in North Sumatera, Indonesia. The questions covers three
categories namely humor incorporation in learning process, humor and its effect to students,
and humor material used by lecturer. The questionnaire was formatted by using Likert scale.
The data were processed and analyzed statistically by using SPSS. More detailed answer was
obtained by interviewing the participant who was selected randomly based on their consent.
The findings reveal that lecturers dominantly believe that humor incorporation in classroom
is important, and it can be used as teaching strategy. The other point is they also believe that
humor incorporation during teaching-learning process can trigger students’ interaction,
enthusiasm, comfort, and motivation as well as lecturers can get respect and positive attitude.
Regarding the material or topic used in performing humor, the lecturers believe that sensitive
thing (pornography, religion, sexuality, and political choice), students’ cultural background,
and lesson learned at that time must be considered. Therefore, it can be suggested that humor
incorporation can be considered as an alternative to kill the pressure and boredom during
online learning session.