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29 January 2024 | Story Igno van Niekerk | Photo Igno van Niekerk
Prof Jannie Pretorius
Prof Jannie Pretorius uses an engaging and humorous teaching style that keeps his Life Science and Natural Science students fascinated and engaged.

Once upon a time, there was a monotonous teacher: the students did not like his lectures. Nothing interesting ever happened. The teacher grew old and retired. The end. Or not? According to research, teaching can be a humorous, fun, and enjoyable experience if you do it differently.

Mr Bean videos and Trevor Noah in the class

Prof Jannie Pretorius, a lecturer in the School of Mathematics, Natural Sciences, and Technology, uses an engaging and humorous teaching style that keeps his Life Science and Natural Science students fascinated and engaged. When starting out at the UFS, Prof Jannie wondered about using humour in a “serious tertiary environment.” He soon discovered that students, like most other people, also enjoy appropriate humour.

Using humour in education turned into a research project, and Prof Pretorius found himself showing Mr Bean videos and watching Trevor Noah shows to develop a lesson where the impact of using intentional humour was studied by measuring students’ reactions. An example from the transcription of his class on the mating habits of the praying mantis, where the female often bites the male’s head off to eat him for nourishment, shows how fun can be integrated into learning:

So, it seems that the praying mantis is like – praying; the male is saying: ‘Please don’t eat me, Sylvia, please!’… (laughter) … and she would pray back and say, ‘Please, Ronnie, I can’t resist you.’ (laughter).

Sensitive to their learners’ preferences

Despite the classes being fun, Prof Pretorius also cautions that it is important for teachers to be sensitive to their learners’ preferences and cultural backgrounds when using humour. “There is always an element of risk in the use of humour. As such, humour should always be used in a respectful and inclusive manner to ensure that all learners feel comfortable and included in the classroom.”

Prof Pretorius recognises that the use of humour depends on educators’ personal preferences. Ultimately, it is about what the students learn.

Listen to Prof Jannie Pretorius talk about his research. 

News Archive

Transforming lives through reading
2014-08-11

 
The UFS Library and Information Services visited Lekhulong Senior Secondary School as one of their community development projects commemorating Mandela Day on 25 June 2014. Situated in the Bloemfontein township of Rocklands, the school’s library was depleted of books and in need of a total revamp. The group of change agents under the guidance and leadership of Marcus Maphile, Assistant Director: Information Services, consisted of seventeen library staff members, library ambassadors and volunteers from Student Life and Leadership.

A total of 450 books were donated to the school. The range of books was made up of mainly dictionaries and encyclopaedias. Fifty of these copies were acquired through the ‘Buy or Donate a Book’ campaign run by the library earlier this year.

In thanking the UFS library, the school’s principal, Mash Mawasha said reading has always been a challenge for his learners and that he is confident that this will be a major turning point for them.

The Director of Library Services, Betsy Eister, expressed the UFS library’s commitment to this project. She pledged regular visits to the school to ensure that Lekhulong library staff are trained on how to run the library and that teachers include library books in their teaching.

“We try to ensure that by the time learners arrive at universities,” Maphile said, “they have exposure to libraries, that they acquire a love for reading books and most importantly have confidence not only to express themselves but to use the library system efficiently.”

The book donation programme has been running successfully for two years and apart from revitalising school libraries in disadvantaged communities, the UFS library staff provides training and support to teacher librarians. Next year, the team plans to extend their project to another community in Bloemfontein – that of Headstart High School.


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