Of Learning and Humor

I was a teacher, but it wasn't until quite recently that I discovered that I was a visual learner. It might seem perplexing that a teacher wouldn't know that, but back when I went to teachers college, I don't even recall being presented with theories about learning styles. Perhaps I wasn't paying attention, but it would seem to me that it would have been taught in psych class, and since that was my favorite (in that year), I rather doubt that it was covered.

Once I had been made aware of them, I would have guessed that I was an auditory learner, and I would have thought that because I rather liked and learned from lectures back in university days. But I was wrong, for a test to ascertain learning styles revealed me to be a visual learner. At first, it didn't seem to square with my liking for the lecture method, but then I was led to understand that it was the professor and his face that I was focusing on and taking cues from. That actually made sense since I could do that because most of the courses that I took were in small classrooms, and I also sat near the front. I could also recall a few large lecture halls and realized that I hadn't done so very well in that sort of impersonal atmosphere where I as far removed from the prof and his or her expressions.

Here's another manifestation of visual learning. As I've mentioned previously I don't do well with names, but I am very good with faces. In my last year of teaching two female students from previous years visited me in my classroom and asked me to sign their yearbooks. Having witnessed me struggle with names in the past, they were somewhat concerned that I might not know who they were. In point of fact, whether I could recall their names that day or not, I knew them very well — exactly where they had sat and what kind of students they had been. I may have even known them better for themselves (as opposed to just names) than most teachers.

I began contemplating this topic upon reading my latest novel, Pigs in Heaven, by Barbara Kingsolver. You see, I was all out of mysteries, so I was perusing Cuppa's bookcase, and she recommended this title. I took her word for it, and began to read it on the next day whilst Zach slept (mercifully, he usually sleeps well and long or I would have even less hair if that were possible). It wasn't long before I let out an "Aha! I've read this already." It wasn't the words, but when a certain picture (brought on by the words, of course) flashed into my head, I realized that I had visualized the scene before: someone falling down a hole of some sort by the Hoover Dam.

However, the whole topic brings another peculiarity to mind: that of humor. Why is it that I, a visual learner appreciate word-based humor (yes, I like puns), while Cuppa, the non-visual learner (who remembers books by their titles) loves visual humor. Yes, indeedy, she cracks right up at the sight of someone falling.

On Oscar night, for example, they played a time lapse of Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin sleeping in the same bed. Apparently, it was quite funny to see their gyrations. I say that because Cuppa, Thesha, and SILly were all howling unrestrainedly. Meanwhile, I sat there serious and puzzled because I honestly didn't find it funny. At least not very funny. Not howling funny. Not splitting your sides funny. Maybe a brief little snicker funny. Hmm, maybe not even that much funny.