The Language of Communication

Danny Singh, UK

Danny Singh, born and raised in London, has been living in Rome, Italy for the last 18 years,
teaching predominantly adults working in companies, Politicians etc. Almost every summer he is a
guest speaker at Pilgrims summer courses. E-mail: singh_danny@hotmail.com

Introduction

Research by Professor Albert Mehrabian at the University of California, shows that 55% of
communication is done using body language, while 38% involves tone of voice. Only 7% is done
with words. Grammar isnt even mentioned. Yet, the vast majority of English teachers continue to
spend the greater part of their lessons explaining and practising grammar forms. In classrooms all
over the world, you can see students sitting on a chair for the best part of a lesson, books open,
while the teacher contrives to explain a seemingly complicated grammar structure.

Grammar

Is it possible to speak a language, if you know grammar, but no words? Is it possible to speak a
language, if you know a few words, but no grammar? I often get stopped in the streets of Rome by
tourists desperately searching for a famous monument. What is amazing is the sheer number of
ways used to ask, what is essentially the same question! Scuse me, where is er Colosseum? You
know where is Colosseum? Do you know where is possible to find Colosseum? Not a bad
attempt the last one, but my favourite has to be, Colosseum? No question words, no verbs,
prepositions or adverbs, but said with exactly the right intonation, the message is clear. This is real
communication.

A Brazilian studying English in London observed how people went about ordering coffee at the
Royal Festival Hall. While he was trying to construct the right grammatical sentence and was in
doubt over whether to use the polite or impolite forms, he noticed that most people simply said,
Two coffees please, and that the barman said, Sugar? instead of, Would you like some sugar?
This is of course perfect English, but there is such a thing as context. This is not a private tea party
among members of the higher establishment, but a busy cafeteria, where saving time is essential to
communication. This can be illustrated further with an extreme example of a person drowning in a
deep river. It would be most correct to say, Excuse me! I was wondering if youd mind helping me,
as I seem to be in some kind of difficulty! However, in a real life situation, the best form of
communication here is, Help! with a terrorised expression on your face and arms waving all over
the place.

A few years ago, I was at a trattoria (a family-run Italian restaurant) in a very popular area of
Rome, known as Testaccio. There were five of us and the tables were placed very close together. We
had decided to have a pizza before going to see a French film called Amelie, which Id highly
recommend to anyone who hasnt seen it. There was an American couple very close to us, who were
clearly having difficulty reading the menu. My dear friend, who was sitting closest to them, began
with, I try to help you. I listened passively as he translated several ingredients. More or less every
sentence he used was grammatically incorrect. However, at the end of his explanation, the couple
thanked him and when he indicated that I was his English teacher, they didnt even start laughing,
but congratulated me. What kind of Americans were they? Had they failed to notice the use of the
present perfect instead of the past simple for an action already finished? Obviously, they didnt care,
as the main goal had been reached, communication! This contrasts with another person in the group,
who remained almost paralysed in her chair and couldnt understand how our other friend had had
the courage to speak, when his level of English was officially lower. I asked her what she did during
her English course, which incidentally was at a private language school. Have you worked out the
answer yet? Yes, lots of grammar and very little conversation!

Words

How important are words to communication? Babies dont start speaking until they are around two
years old. Yet up until then, they rarely have problems indicating what they want. How do they
communicate without words and tone of voice? With rapid hand and foot movements, eye
movements and a series of grunts and noises to show approval, appreciation or rejection. As they
begin absorbing and comprehending the sounds of their parents, they also use their hands and
fingers to point to what they want. Mothers and fathers may require a certain amount of patience,
but they dont often have difficulties identifying the needs of their young offspring.

What about cats and dogs, the most common pets? How many words are there in the vocabulary of
a cat? Only one that comes to mind, thats meow! Dogs have a slightly larger vocabulary, which
consists of woof woof and bow-wow. These sounds by the way, vary from country to country, so if
by any chance, the cats and dogs where you are, make different sounds to the aforementioned, dont
start snarling or growling at me!

Cat and dog owners usually understand the needs of their pets. How do dogs and cats communicate
with such a small vocabulary? Intonation is of great importance. Each individual meow has a
different meaning. With one word, a cat can indicate if it is hungry, tired, angry, afraid or in need of
affection. Dogs similarly, use different tones in their bark to help their owners understand their
specific needs and requirements.

Cats and dogs naturally use a lot of body language. Dogs wag their tails to show when they are
excited. The position of their ears can also indicate their emotional frame of mind. Cats meanwhile
will move their tails when they are not happy about something. They purr to express their emotions
and their hairs stand on end, when they are frightened. Both cats and dogs use their tongues to
communicate in various situations, something far less common in the human race due to social
conventions, apart from when people are speaking Spanish.

How many words are there in the English language or in any language for that matter? Just open
any dictionary and you will see! People have such a large number of words to communicate with
and still there are so many misunderstandings. What would happen if human beings spoke
languages that consisted of just one or two words? Stress, intonation and rhythm would be
fundamental. In fact, they are of absolute importance, even with the many thousands of words at our
disposition.

Take a basic word like hello! Hello can mean so many different things according to the way you say
it. It can be an open jovial hello, indicating your interest in the person, or a quick grunt with no eye
contact, showing your feeling of total indifference or a desire to make no further contact with the
person in that moment. It can be a nervous hello, demonstrating your possible fear, or it can be
opened out in such a way to make it sound even sensual, thereby communicating your sexual
attraction toward that person.

This can be practiced with students. Take any word and get your students to say it as many times as
possible, in as many different ways as possible, with different levels of emphasis, feelings and
emotions. Get the other students to then identify what the real message is. Apart from being
extremely entertaining, it is interesting to see how effective we are at identifying and
comprehending what people really want to say.

Intonation

Intonation is the most important aspect of pronunciation. A couple of years ago, an Italian colleague
was trying out his English pronunciation skills on one of those multi-media courses, where you read
out a sentence and the programme gives you a result. He was giving a pretty poor performance in
trying to say, Im a doctor. The computer kept giving him about 52%. After several attempts, he
uttered a few swear words at the computer, called me over and asked me to read the sentence. I did
so with my perfect English accent and the computer awarded me 96%. Wow! He uttered a few more
obscenities, before trying again himself. Once again, he repeated the expression with a poor
pronunciation; however, this time he copied my rhythm and intonation. The computer gave him
84%, which illustrates my point that good intonation is more valuable than a good pronunciation.

I remember walking into a classroom several years ago for a lesson with a new student on a one-to-
one basis. I politely asked him, How are you to which he responded automatically with a, Fine
thanks, and you? Hed obviously learned this from one of those direct method courses. Thats
where they train you to respond rapidly to any question thrown at you. The only problem in this
case, is that both his intonation and body language said, Absolutely awful. In fact, my first
reaction was that I had misheard his answer, so I asked him to repeat himself. He did and it was
exactly the same. When I asked him about his past experience with the English language, he
mentioned a course at one of those direct method schools.

Try following a conversation among people speaking a language that you dont know. Its difficult
isnt it? Now try focusing purely on their intonation. You may well find that you can guess some of
what they are saying. This will depend of course on how much intonation they use, one of the
problems being that some people use little or no intonation. However, most people do use intonation
in their speech, so unless you are terribly unlucky, you should be able to comprehend something.

Another fun activity is getting students to practice stressing and pronouncing words in several
different ways. This makes them see how ridiculous something can seem, if said with the wrong
intonation. This task is facilitated, if the students are able to stand up and move freely around the
classroom, which takes us nicely on to body language.

Body Language

Body language and everything which relates to it is used sparingly in the classroom. Eye contact,
hand movements, facial gestures, body posture and the physical distance between people are
fundamental skills in the language of communication. How else can we explain the fact that some
people manage to travel all over the world, totally unable to speak any foreign language, yet remain
perfectly capable of communicating their needs to anyone they come across? Others spend months
and even years following expensive and time-consuming courses, only to find that when they get
the opportunity to speak, they freeze. People who speak the same language have misunderstandings
on an almost daily basis. Even same nationality married couples, have enormous communication
difficulties, as Im sure you all know.

Textbook lovers among you may remember The Girl with Green Eyes from an old edition of
Headway Elementary. A couple were travelling in a train and while the husband was blabbering on,
the wife began looking at a tall dark man, who was reading a newspaper. The husband then went off
to get some food. When he came back, he noticed that his wife was missing. A young child told him
that his wife had got off the train with the tall dark man. The husband couldnt comprehend how
this had happened. No words were exchanged, he insisted. In this case, it was purely eye contact, as
green eyes looked deeply into dark brown eyes. This is an excellent example of communication
using only eye contact. The husband, who had been blabbering on, thought that he was
communicating, but he had no idea how to communicate, hence he found himself in this awful
predicament. We communicate far more with our eyes than we care to notice. Just think of when we
are in crowded places, shopping centres, public transport etc.

You can spend hours demonstrating different kinds of facial gestures and body posture with students
and they usually recognise the differences quite easily, but when it comes to using it in their
communication, they rarely use it, preferring to concentrate on their actual spoken language, made
in an unnatural classroom setting. These are areas that need to be mastered, both in their own
language, as well as in a foreign one. It is as fundamental to good communication, as intonation is.
People dont listen to every word you say. They usually listen to the sounds, rhythm and intonation.
Only when you say something that they are not expecting, will they suddenly switch on.

In language learning, there is an additional problem, cultural differences! This means that there are
differences in eye contact, hand movements, facial gestures, body posture and the physical distance
at which people feel comfortable, while talking to each other.

I have been giving workshops on the subject of body language at Pilgrims in the Canterbury hilltops
for many years and while there in its thriving multi-national community; I have an ideal
environment in which to do my experiments.

In an average workshop, Ill have 20-30 people from at least 7-8 nationalities. Its interesting to see
how far the stereotypes we have of different nationalities are in fact, so close to the truth. There is
always one Spanish girl whose idea of comfortable physical distance is almost body-to-body
contact and she usually grins with pleasure as the sweat drips down my face, demonstrating my
anxiety. I get my revenge however, with the Japanese girl who stands at the other side of the room,
refusing to move. When I then take one step forward, she will invariably start screaming.

From years of experimenting, the stereotypes usually hold up. However, there is always the
exception to the rule. The girl who claims to be Spanish, but wont let me anywhere near her, or the
German man waving his arms about and making eye contact. Surely not, you ask? Well, that was
once, but as I said before, there are rare exceptions.

Nationality is of course, not the only factor involved in body language. There is also that of gender.
Females tend to be more communicative with their bodies when talking to each other, than men
talking to men. An interesting situation to observe is the male-female communication. If it is first
time contact, there will usually be a certain caution between the two, with each one respecting the
others space.

So apart from nationality and gender, there is of course the personality of the individual. No
unanimous conclusions can be drawn, but a few generalisations can be made.

A great activity to illustrate the above is to get students to react in different ways to demonstrate
interest and attention, or lack of it, to the speaker. They should do this with their body posture, hand
movements and facial gestures. We are conditioned, as we grow older to move our face muscles less
and less. A lot of tension and stress is therefore contained within the face muscles, while the use of
simple facial gestures can help alleviate this, as well as enabling us to communicate better.
Another activity I often do while waiting for a train to depart from a train station, is watching the
people outside on the platform and trying to imagine what they are talking about. In Italy of course,
you see lots of arms waving around, but you may be surprised to learn that even in an English pub,
you can observe people from a distance communicating with what seems like excessive body
language. Try observing people whose conversation you cant hear and put together a kind of
dialogue based purely on their body language!

Once these activities have been done with students, they can be put together to combine word stress,
intonation and body language, showing how fundamental they are as assets in the language of
communication.

How and why we teach?

This article clearly illustrates how communication is a mixture of body language, tone of voice,
rhythm, stress and a few words. With this in mind, we as teachers, have to consider how and why
we teach languages, why it is often so grammar orientated, why the majority of students spend
much of their time doing passive, written gap-fill exercises, but are then unable to communicate
once out on the street. Why do state schoolteachers spend a two-hour lesson practising nationalities,
many of which will never be used again, or even worse the use of the apostrophe to illustrate
possession? Is it any wonder that many students eventually reach the point where they resign
themselves to the fact that English is an impossible language for them to learn?

Dont get me wrong! I am not against the teaching of grammar or accuracy in language teaching. If
a student has to do an official presentation, then accurate formal English is of primary importance.
However, the majority of students need English for the purpose of informal communication.

Even more startling figures show that 95% of language teachers regularly use textbooks! Like some
students, they feel insecure without them. The majority of textbooks are archaic even before they
become out of date and deal with issues, which have little or no connection to the reality of the
student. What do we plan to do, to make our teaching more successful and productive for the
students? Our role as teachers is to get our students to communicate confidently and to stimulate our
students to have the desire to learn. So, throw away those overrated and overpriced text books and
start teaching real communication, using body language, role play, real-life experiences, emotional
intelligences and multi-sensory experiences, to name but a few.
Memory, Music and Emotion in Learning
Danny Singh, UK

The Complexities of Memory and Learning

Memory is one of the most complex subjects known to man. Why is it that there are some things
that you just cannot remember? The more you try to remember, the more you forget. Why is it that
there are things you have no wish to remember and in some cases they have little importance to
you, yet you cannot forget them?

My one-to-one lessons are often interrupted by urgent phone calls taken by my students, which
may last a couple of minutes. It is amazing how often neither I, nor my student can remember what
we were talking about before the interruption. How many great conversations have been ended, as a
result of a phone call?

I sometimes go to the kitchen to get something, only to forget the reason I went there in the first
place. I then have to return to my original position to help me remember. On other occasions, I may
forget where I left something in the house. In order to aid my memory, I go through all my
movements again in some kind of chronological order, which usually works. The more agitated you
are, the more difficult it is to remember.

When I go to a cash point machine to withdraw money, I have to remember a pin number. I try to
picture in my mind the actual position and movement of my hands in pressing the numbers, rather
than the numbers themselves. My knowledge of the buses in Rome is so good, that when asked
about a particular street, I can often identify the numbers of all the buses that go down that street.
The problem obviously occurs in streets where buses do not run.

I enjoy cooking, but while some people love following the instructions in recipe books, the
accumulation of cookery books in my home is unlikely to stimulate me. This is not because I cannot
read, but that I honestly find following a written down recipe dulls my multi-sensorial needs. All the
dishes that I have learned from other people, I have pictured in my mind. I can also sense the smell
and taste of the dishes as I prepare them.

My sister lives in a block of eighteen flats. As she has a good knowledge of car brands, she links
each person and their flat number according to the particular car that they drive. Those of us who
have good orientation skills, usually use certain buildings, shops or other places that stand out as
our points of reference. Each of us has our own individual way of remembering and memorising
different pieces of information.

Different Kinds of memory

There are many different kinds of memory. One of the most common is habitual memory. This is
where one action, is almost always followed by another. A cat will therefore know, simply by
observing its owner and his/her movements over a period of time, when it is about to be put to bed
or out in the rain. It can therefore escape for a short time, before eventually being caught. Similarly,
a small baby can predict as it is being placed into its chair for the umpteenth time, that dinner is
about to be served. If the baby is anything like me, it will get excited and gleefully wave its arms all
over the place.

Another common form of memory is short-term memory. That is, remembering lots of information
in a short period of time. Some students who have a strong short term memory, will use this skill to
cram information into their heads just days or even hours before their exams, perform remarkably
well, then just as quickly, forget almost all that they studied. Our students often do gap-fill exercises
on the same basis. They study a particular grammar structure, perform a few exercises successfully,
assume that they have understood it and that they can use it correctly in conversation.

Word association is a good way of memorising vocabulary. That is why presumably, teachers often
teach words together that are opposites. Sometimes a word is easy to remember because in some
way it sounds silly. If it does, thats great. The sillier the better. The consequence of this is that I
now know some words in Dutch and Slovenian to name a couple of languages, that I will never use
in any practical conversation, yet I will never forget them. This contrasts heavily with the view that
the more you actively use an expression, the more likely you are to remember it, though this is of
course true in most cases. Doing is indeed, one real way of learning.

Having looked generally at the subject of memory and learning, we are now going to examine more
specifically two subjects that I consider fundamental to memory and learning; emotion and music.

Memory and Emotion

Those of you old enough will remember what you were doing when news came through of
President Kennedys assassination on 22 November 1963. Italians all remember what they were
doing when the great statesman Aldo Moro was first kidnapped, then murdered in 1978. Even more,
they remember what they were doing when they won the football world cup in 1982, not to mention
2006.
With the increase in the power of the media and globalization, the premature death of Princess
Diana on 31 August 1997 and the collapse of the twin towers on 11 September 2001 had so much
global TV coverage that people all over the world will remember what they were doing when news
came through of these two tragedies.

Not only do we remember what we were doing, but also where we were, who we were with, the
temperature, aromas, colours and all kinds of trivial information which we normally forget over the
course of time. The reason for this is quite simple. The information, which we would not normally
remember, is inevitably linked to the emotion experienced. The strength of your memory recall is
related to your feelings on the subject. If for example, you have little or no recollection of what you
were doing when news of Princess Dianas death came out, it is not because you have a bad
emotional memory, but simply that you are either indifferent or dont have especially strong
feelings on the subject.

Apart from famous world events, there are personal events; birthdays, exam results, weddings,
anniversaries, funerals and first loves, not to mention second and third loves, where our memory is
inextricably linked to the emotion felt within that experience. Interestingly, most parents remember
their childs first day at school, more than the child him/herself does. Most of us should be able to
remember the emotions we felt as we read our school-leaving exam results, what we ate or drank
that day and where we spent the rest of the day. We should also find it difficult to forget our first
loves, the sensations within as we gazed into our beloveds eyes, the aromas and sounds which
surrounded us and the warmth of the hot English sun! These emotional memories linger on for years
and years.
The Power of Music

Music can be amazingly powerful. You only have to think of the Mozart effect, which claims that
listening to certain pieces of Mozarts music can increase learning capacities, making students more
creative. It also has therapeutic benefits, such as reducing pains and curing illnesses. Several
supermarkets deliberately play certain kinds of music in a bid to try to influence our spending
patterns. It has been shown that there is often a connection between the music played in a shop and
how much we as customers are prepared to spend.

Think of your favourite TV ads! Why do you particularly like those ones? The reasons are almost
certainly linked to the use of humour and music. What about ads that you dont like? How often
have you found yourself humming a tune that you detest, but cant get out of your head? Thats the
power of music!

Every time I return home after attending a live music concert, I almost invariably sleep deeply.
People use music in a variety of ways; to wake up in the morning, on their journeys to work, while
working in the office and before they go to sleep. Some find it helps them when they are studying,
others while they are cooking or cleaning. One of the reasons that it can be an incredibly powerful
instrument is that it has such an enormous influence on our emotions.

Memory, music and emotion

While growing up, the first Olympic games that I followed seriously was the 1992 Barcelona
games. A significant factor in that decision was the theme music played by the BBC, Barcelona by
Queen. The greatest film that I saw in 1997, though made a year earlier, was Shine. When I burst
into tears ten minutes before the end, it was not because of my great sympathy for the main
character who had been psychologically abused by his father, nor was it for the condition in which
he found himself. You try listening to Rachmaninovs second and third piano concertos for two and
a half hours without shedding a tear!

You cannot think of the film, Death in Venice, without remembering Mahlers fifth symphony
which sets the dismal mood, as Dirk Bogart heads towards his death, which seems to take an
eternity. Hitchcocks most famous scene in Psycho is amazingly effective, not because of the sight
of a hand bearing a knife, nor the sound of a girl having a shower behind the curtain, but because of
the squeaking violins. Similarly, the music to the film Jaws, sends a tingle down our spines, not
simply the picture of a shark swimming towards a boat.

As I have shown, some of the best films rely heavily on music to create the right atmosphere. Even
the silent films of Charlie Chaplin are much improved by the music which gives them pace and
rhythm. A good friend of mine who is totally blind, lists going to the cinema as one of her hobbies.
Yes, I was also a little surprised when she told me, especially when she could describe some films
in great detail. She sensed my bewilderment and explained that apart from listening to the
dialogues, her strong sensitivity to music as she is herself a qualified piano player, enabled her to
create her own picture in her mind.

In 1990, the World Cup football tournament was held in Italy. For the Italians, it ended with
Donadoni blasting the ball over the bar in a semi-final penalty shoot-out. The BBC ended its
coverage that evening with this image and the sound of Pavarotti singing Nessun Dorma. For over
ten years, I had the image of Donadoni missing that penalty every time I heard Nessun Dorma.
Thankfully, it ended when I saw a Spanish film, Mar Dentro, in which a paraplegic man who wants
nothing more than a dignified death, dreams of himself flying in his bed, playing to the music of,
yes youve guessed it, Nessun Dorma.

How can we apply all this to our teaching and learning?

Researchers and linguists have come up with an enormity of ideas linking memory and learning. We
have already seen that emotional memory can facilitate learning immensely.

If I have to teach the word blind, I can either give the translation, or give a clear definition. A blind
person is a person who cannot see. How long will my students remember that? If I get my students
to close their eyes and be guided around the room for a few minutes, having to trust the person
guiding them, the experience is so strong that I honestly cannot believe they will forget it easily.
Every time they hear the word blind, they will remember that classroom experience.

Aside from this example, we need to escape from the dour and uninspiring material found in
numerous books and really get to know our students. Focus on them and what they find interesting!
Topics such as childhood can provoke emotions, as can achievements in sport and personal
successes.

One of my students had great difficulty with the three main conditionals. He was a big Roma
football fan. I gave him real examples, using the performance of his favourite football team. He
understood so well, that he was eventually able to use all three conditionals perfectly, citing real
examples on a weekly basis. I could feel the emotion coming from within him, as he completed the
sentence with, If Montella had scored, Roma would have won the match. It works far better than
the overused, What would you do if you won the lottery? While it is nice to dream from time to
time, how many of us actually know someone who has won the lottery?

It is clear from what we have seen that memory and emotion are strongly linked. If we can apply
these to our teaching, using some of the techniques mentioned above and others, we will help our
students, not only to understand difficult concepts, but also to remember them in the long-term and
so encourage and promote real learning.

Thanks to emotion and music, certain events remain forever etched in our minds. Once we accept
the link between memory, music and emotion, we have to acknowledge that music and emotion are
both important learning and teaching tools. Most teachers do not utilise music effectively in the
classroom. Some dont use it at all, while others keep the same disc playing all through the lesson.

To start with, music can help to change the pace of the lesson. Liven things up a bit with some rock
or dance music if your students are dozing off. If they are hyperactive, then try some calming,
relaxing music. If the lesson is more than an hour, the music should certainly be changing. If you
have five activities in a lesson, try using five different pieces of music. That way, when students try
to remember the activities, they can link a different piece of music to each activity. You should find
that this helps their concentration levels too and they might even be humming or whistling a tune,
well after they have left your lesson.
Laughter Yoga in English Language Teaching
Danny Singh, UK

What is Laughter Yoga?

Laughter Yoga is where some traditional aspects of yoga, such as breathing and stretching are
combined with stimulated group laughter to create a series of movements and sounds. This is done
repeatedly, a typical session lasting from 20 45 minutes. There are an unlimited number of laughs
available, the most famous being the welcome laugh, the lion laugh, the bear laugh and the milk-
shake laugh.

The origin of Laughter Yoga

The first Laughter club was set up on 13 March 1995 in Mumbai, India. This is a very easy date for
me to remember, as its both my mothers birthday and the date on which the greatest ever film
director, Krzysztof Kieslowski, died.

Madan Kataria, an Indian doctor doing research on stress, discovered that when we laugh using our
stomach muscles, our body reacts in an amazingly positive way, irrespective of whether we are
genuinely happy or not. With this in mind and with some assistance from his wife who is a yoga
teacher, he decided that we could all laugh for no reason.

Initially, with his first five club members, he contrived, as you would imagine, to spend an hour
telling jokes. This obviously produced a few laughs and continued as the others told theirs, but
eventually, this all came to a standstill, as they eventually ran out of jokes, some people either didnt
understand them or found them offensive and others did not have a sense of humour.

So, he created this seemingly ridiculous technique, where we look into each others eyes, mime a
situation and laugh. To an outsider looking on, a group of people performing Laughter Yoga in this
way could appear to be totally mad. However, it must be remembered that laughing is a serious
business and it is not until you actively experience it, that you realise just what a powerful
instrument it is. As an Indian lady once said, anyone who doesnt do Laughter Yoga must be
completely mad!

The club in Mumbai grew rapidly and Dr. Kataria and his wife proceeded to export their idea to
foreign lands. In just thirteen years, the idea has diffused enormously. To get an idea of the effect,
just have a look at the website and see how widespread it is in countries such as the USA, India,
Denmark and Germany.

Mr. Kataria and his wife Madhuri, continue to spread their ideas, in part with the help of localised
conductors, but also through an immense amount of time spent travelling and doing sessions in
business centres, TV studios, hospitals, schools and open parks.

How I first got involved with Laughter Yoga

I first heard about Laughter Yoga in 2005 through a good friend of mine here in Rome, who knew I
was fairly open-minded and always curious to learn new things. She told me about a presentation
that was going on and managed to persuade me to go along. The conductor gave us a short
theoretical explanation and some background about the subject. We then began doing the exercises
and laughing. I have to say that I didnt especially feel like laughing, not that I was unhappy at the
time, but the effect of being with another 10-15 people all laughing out loud (laughter like many
things is contagious), had its desired effect and soon, I was laughing for no reason.

I left the event thinking that Id had an enjoyable time with a group of mad people. Yes, it was fun,
but all this talk about eliminating stress and pain, improving sleep patterns, reducing cholesterol and
even fighting cancer, was absurdly exaggerated and over the top.

A week later, I found myself staying with a friend in Madrid. As she was a teacher, I offered to do a
lesson for her, as a thank you for hosting me and putting up with all my defects. She naturally
agreed, so I prepared a lesson, based mainly on communication activities, the kind of things you
learn from attending Pilgrims workshops. As there were expected to be thirty-five students aged 17-
60, I decided that I needed an especially lively warmer to wake them up. Yes, why not! I could do
about ten minutes of that Laughter Yoga thing.

As the students walked in, they looked friendly, but a little tired. After all, it was 5pm, so most of
them had come from work, some from school or university and it was then that I began to have
doubts about my warmers. What if they didnt work? There was a 60 year old man who looked
quite serious. Would he refuse to participate? What if no-one laughed? It would be two hours of
absolute hell!

I gritted my teeth, kept a straight face (difficult to do at the same time), and began. A young,
courageous volunteer helped me to illustrate the welcome laugh. We repeated it. Her laugh was
noticeably shy, to be expected, I suppose. I turned to the group and said, Ok, now you do it! They
all turned to someone near them, shook hands and laughed out loud. The noise was deafening.
Great! We then did the milk-shake laugh, then the lion laugh and finally the laugh I usually use to
close a session, where the group stands in a circle holding hands and slowly moves to the centre
before looking up and letting out one big laugh all together. They loved it.

I then explained the first real activity of the lesson, which I had learned from Hania Kryszewska
(one of the top trainers at Pilgrims), that summer. It involved each student talking to as many people
as possible and finding one thing that they had in common. The great thing about this activity was
that it got them moving. As there were so many students, I decided Id stop it after about 10
minutes, even though they appeared to be having a great time, otherwise Id run out of time for the
other activities that I had planned. How do you stop a large group of students who happen to be
making a lot of noise and having a good time? With a bit of hand waving, I finally got them to stop.
When I politely said that I thought it was time to move on to the next activity, I was given a slightly
disconsolate look from about ten of them. One of them then said out loud, but Ive only spoken to
21 people. I still have another 13 to speak to. There were cheers and various sounds of approval,
similar to what you hear in the House of Commons during a Parliamentary debate in London.

I looked into the girls eyes and realised that I couldnt refuse her request. When I told them all they
could continue, they seemed ecstatic. The most miserable person in the room was me. How was I
going to fit in all the other activities, now that my timing had gone out of the window?

The best bit was yet to come! As we did the next part of the lesson, which was sitting down in a
circle, while the students threw questions at me, I could feel the energy in the room. The 60 year old
man was smiling. In fact, it was difficult to find anyone in the room who wasnt smiling. I could
hear some of the students deep breathing. It was at this point that I suddenly realised, the students
had been totally reenergised by Laughter Yoga and as such, what a powerful instrument it could be.

After that, I went straight to the internet and looked up the site: www.laughteryoga.org. I was then
shocked to find that it was not simply an odd activity carried out by peace protestors left over from
the 1960s, but a widely diffused activity which involved people of all ages and backgrounds.

What I did next

I decided that I needed to attend some of the Laughter Yoga sessions at the club in Rome, where I
had experienced the presentation, in order to learn more laughs. However, at that time, these
sessions were almost always on a Wednesday evening, which interfered with my viewing of the
Champions League football. I did eventually find a solution, which was a workshop weekend in a
small town in the hills of Lazio.

At this workshop, I was one of a group of about fifteen. From Friday evening to Sunday afternoon,
we did hundreds of laughs, quite a bit of theory and discussion and even some traditional yoga. I
was now a qualified Laughter Yoga conductor. More importantly, I had far more confidence to use
Laughter Yoga in the class, knowing that I had an infinite number of laughs available and
understanding the health benefits much more. One of the effects it had on me, was that for a week, I
slept ten hours a night, straight through, no interruptions, despite the best efforts of my neighbours,
who usually save me having to set the alarm clock.

Needless to say, I continued using Laughter Yoga with my groups, average size four. They did of
course, initially consider me mad, but having been used to my warmers, they did at least comply
with my instructions. After a time, most of them began to feel comfortable with Laughter Yoga and
soon it was just one part of the lesson.

I gave and attended other workshops on the subject, with groups of different sizes and backgrounds.
As we shall see later, I then decided to take Laughter Yoga to Pilgrims.

How a typical session might work

A Laughter Yoga session can vary enormously, depending on who the conductor is, the number of
people involved and the kind of participants who attend.

Before we start laughing seriously, it is of crucial importance to get the participants breathing
properly. The conductor should therefore illustrate that we breathe in deeply through the nose and
breathe out deeply through the mouth. This is generally done with the following movement. Our
starting position is to touch our toes. As we take a deep breath in, we move our arms up and above
our head. As we breathe out, we move back down to the starting position. This action is repeated
four or five times.

The next objective is to energise the group. This is done by clapping to the rhythm; ho, ho, ha, ha,
ha! Having got the participants warmed up, we proceed to the laughing itself. Each individual
conductor will have his/her preference as to which laughs he/she wishes to start and finish with.

I personally, always begin with a welcome laugh, as it seems the most appropriate. Ill then do the
milkshake laugh. After this, I usually do several animal laughs, which bring out the infantile
side of our personalities. I then vary the rest of the session, depending on the kind of participants
attending. If they are business employees, the having a row and apologising laughs will often
work well.

As we all begin laughing together, it is up to the conductors discretion to decide when to stop it.
This is done by starting the ho, ho, ha, ha, ha clapping and is very effective, both in keeping order
and in directing the proceedings. After the clapping, two or three deep breathing movements are
done, before a new laugh is introduced.

I almost always end a session with a laugh that unifies the group. We stand in a circle, holding
hands, slowly move forward to reach the centre, whereupon, we throw our arms up, look up at the
sky and let out one big laugh altogether.

Is laughter really necessary anyway?

Consider this: babies aged six months to two years spend a lot of their time smiling and chuckling.
Its relatively easy to get them to smile. Is it because all babies have a sense of humour? Of course
not! Is it easy to get all adults to smile? No, it certainly isnt!

Children in general, laugh 300-400 times a day; adults only 15. Children dont set conditions as to
when and why they laugh, hence, you could even say they laugh for no reason. Adults become
conditioned as they go through life and often purposely choose not to laugh, as it is considered
unprofessional, infantile and not suitable for someone of high ranking.

Laughter is simple and natural. Childish and infantile it may be to some extent, but as each human
being is made up of different components, either you accept you have a childish part that needs to
be expressed from time to time, just as every person has a feminine side, a creative side, an
intellectual side and an aggressive side, or you keep it hidden away, pretending it doesnt exist and
thereby feeling frustrated and inadequate in numerous situations.

Laughter is a serious business, as it produces endorphins which help to strengthen our immune
system and combat disease. Evidence shows that laughter is in fact, akin to a successful, productive
person. A satisfied employee will always work better than an unsatisfied one, who does the bare
minimum to get by. Laughter is clearly fundamental to our wellbeing, our ability to affront lifes
everyday surprises and keeps us looking and feeling young. Just look at some of those people who
never laugh and see the difference!

Doesnt doing the same laughs get boring?

Once weve seen the physical and mental benefits of doing Laughter Yoga, our aim should be to do
a Laughter Yoga session, as often as possible. Therefore, the above question could be asked.

If you are doing the same laughs, but with different people in different sessions, there will always
be differences. Both the laughs produced and the reactions can never be the same. What about if
you want to do it regularly, with exactly the same group of people? Even here, the reactions will
vary according to the time of day, general mood and energy levels.

One of the great things however, is that there is no limit to the different kinds of laughs you can do.
If you are a creative person, you can invent new laughs on a daily basis, just by looking at personal
situations, ones own life experiences, daily routines etc..
If a group has been doing Laughter Yoga together for some time, they should dedicate a part of the
session to creating some new laughs, either individually, or in small groups. Once a group is
comfortable doing Laughter Yoga with you, this process becomes quite simple. I often get children
to do it, as they are very creative. Many of them mime animals better than me and they get great
satisfaction from the fact that it is their own personal creation. If the children respond positively to
Laughter Yoga, I might even get them to do it towards the end of a first session, in the form of a
competition. This usually inspires them to come up with something interesting. Only if I have a
terribly passive and introverted group, might I refrain from doing this.

Laughter Yoga at Pilgrims 2007

During a wet and windy summer in Canterbury, I gave two Laughter Yoga workshops at Pilgrims.
Despite heavy competition from salsa night and other high quality workshops of a more intellectual
nature, I still managed to get around twenty participants on each occasion.

These workshops were not normal Laughter Yoga workshops, as they were directed exclusively
towards teachers. I gave a general outline of the subject and the ideas behind it, before we got down
to some real physical exertion (see, How a typical session might work). The temperature was just
about tolerable enough to be able to do this part outside. I then concluded by handing out
photocopies of about 10 different articles on the subject, published in newspapers all around the
English speaking world, from South Africa to Canada and India to the USA. It was, you could say, a
very heavy and intensive session.

I immediately got positive feedback, with participants telling me how much lighter and more
relaxed they felt. This continued the next day, with others telling me how well they had slept
compared to normal. I got the feeling that all the participants appreciated the physical and mental
benefits for themselves, but whether or not, they were willing to go into it more deeply and use it in
their classrooms, was another matter.

In the first workshop, Pilgrims own guru Mario Rinvolucri, decided to turn up. He has a raucous
bear-like laugh, which helps to stimulate others, who might not normally be so willing. I asked him
for some feedback on the session and what he said, proved very interesting. He and others noticed,
that with some of the laughs we did, I was not so convincing. The reason for this is quite simple. We
all have our favourite and non-favourite laughs. I had deliberately chosen to do some of those I
liked less, in order to illustrate the fact that not all the laughs are based on animals. Hence, we did
laughs related to everyday situations, such as the car not starting, racing to catch the plane, winning
the lottery etc..

This leads to an important point, which is that the conductor should stick to the laughs that he/she
prefers and feels comfortable with. In the same way, if a teacher is not convinced of what he/shes
teaching, the students will soon catch on. In the second of the two Pilgrims workshops, I selected
the laughs far more carefully.

The participants came from far and wide; Finland, Spain, Slovenia, Germany, Portugal, Holland, to
name just a few. Interestingly, in both workshops, one of the participants was about four months
pregnant. I assume this is just coincidence and not a cause or an effect of being at Pilgrims.

Id like to take this opportunity to thank all the teachers for their active participation and ask them
to contact me in order to update their experiences on the subject. My e-mail address is at the head of
this article. I would also be willing to travel, if any of them would like me to use it with them in
their schools. I have in fact, already visited a few primary schools in Europe and the observations I
have made, make quite interesting reading.

Laughter Yoga in primary schools

During the last year, I have had the opportunity to try out Laughter Yoga with children in Primary
schools in both Madrid and Rotterdam. In total, I had eight different classes aged 6-11 and used a
similar procedure with all of them. I began by getting their names and then giving a brief
introduction of myself, not by talking and boring them to death, but with a succession of guessing
games and stress/intonation games which they tend to appreciate. I didnt spend any time at all
explaining the theory, but just did a physical demonstration, using the methods already explained in,
How a typical session might work. Apart from the welcome and milkshake laughs, we did a series
of animal laughs, before ending in the usual way.

This generally lasted for about 20-30 minutes, after which I was shattered, not being used to the
noise and energy levels of kids. I then asked them to get into groups of three or four and create a
laugh to demonstrate to the rest of the class. I would then vote for the best two groups, before
getting the other students to vote for the group that they thought was the best. This saved me getting
abused by the kids and accused of unfairness. In many cases, they enjoyed this part of the session
most.

Observations and feedback

The first thing to note is that just as how, no two students are exactly the same, no one group will
react in exactly the same way as another. My expectations beforehand were that the children would
love the idea of laughing, playing, moving around and expressing themselves and although this was
largely true, the results were not as clear-cut as you might expect.

The immediate effect is quite a shock to the participant and in fact, the less disciplined, more
kinaesthetically inclined kids loved Laughter Yoga immediately. The quieter, calmer and more
studious ones were clearly uncomfortable. However, as the activity proceeded, the laughs became
bigger and by the end, at least 90% of the kids expressed their appreciation of it. They also agreed
that they felt better, more energised, but at the same time, more relaxed.

About 5% of the children didnt look too happy and said they felt tired. I couldnt help noticing that
these kids were slightly overweight, as they probably spend a large part of their time alone, playing
computer games and doing virtually no physical exercise. This reaction is wholly unnatural and
forty years ago would have been unthinkable, but is today perhaps a sign of our times.

The groups that really got into it and worked well together, were in fact harmonious groups that felt
a strong sense of unity and group identity. There were some kids who were passive, felt self-
conscious and inadequate and didnt want to participate. The groups that didnt work well together,
were surprise, surprise, groups that didnt have a strong sense of unity or good relations with each
other. I only discovered the nature of each group when speaking with their main teacher after the
activity itself.

I would expect most of the children to feel refreshed and energised, just as they would with any
physical activity. However, what I find really interesting, is the effect of Laughter Yoga on their
learning capacities. To understand this, I needed to speak to their main teachers and find out about
their behavioural patterns in their following lessons.
In most cases, the teachers reported that their kids seemed to be calmer and more relaxed, having
got rid of their hyperactive energy and therefore concentrated better on the lesson in hand. In one
case, where the students were expected to read quietly, the teacher reported that some of the kids
were dozing off. This was also linked to the fact that before the Laughter Yoga session, they had
done physical education. So, while falling asleep may not be what you want from your students, it
does show that Laughter Yoga helps you to relax.

Many of the kids were enthusiastic enough to ask when I would be coming back. I did manage to go
back to one group on a second occasion. A big difference on this occasion, was that each time I
asked for a volunteer to help me demonstrate a laugh in front of the class, every hand went up,
while on the first occasion, only the outgoing kids volunteered. This shows that after the initial first
impact which is quite strong, the kids feel more comfortable and at ease with this activity. It
certainly reduces their inhibitions, as shown by shy, introverted kids begging to be chosen.

How can Laughter Yoga really be effective in the classroom?

The research that I have done so far and will continue to do, is not based on any kind of scientific
method, but neither is it intended to be. It is a general analysis of how and when Laughter Yoga can
be applied to language teaching or teaching in general and what effects it can have, both as an end
in itself and as a learning aid.

It works well as a physical exercise, which gets the students moving around the classroom. In
addition, it helps to break down inhibitions, particularly important for the shy students in the long
term. It gets the blood circulating, improves breathing patterns and enables the brain to work better.
It is a socialising activity, encouraging group unity. If done properly, it encourages students to
respect one another, as they laugh with each other and not, at each other.

As mentioned previously, many of the kids loved the part of the session where they could create
their own laughs. Children are very creative. Those of you who teach them will know that. The
quality of their mime is very high, certainly better than mine. The one problem however, is that the
kids are sometimes so concentrated on their mime, that they forget to laugh. As laughter itself is an
essential aspect of the activity, it is imperative that the teacher makes sure the kids are aware that
they have to laugh.

For a teacher who is thinking of presenting Laughter Yoga to their class, the hardest part is the first
time. After this, it can only get easier. The teacher must feel comfortable using it. This can be
acquired by joining a local club, following a national weekend course or even better, attending an
international conference where Mr. Kataria is himself present. Once the teacher feels confident
enough to present it, it can be used at any time of the lesson. It should ideally be used in short spells
and as such, can easily be fitted into even the tightest of schedules and most rigid school systems.
The teacher him/herself can monitor any changes in the students learning behaviour and act
accordingly.

Conclusion

I will continue to use Laughter Yoga as a tool in both my teaching of adults and children. I would
love to hear from any of you who either use it, have used it, or would like to use it with your
students.
Anyone who is planning to be at Pilgrims this summer 20 July-2 Aug 2008, will have the
opportunity to actively participate in a Laughter Yoga workshop with me and feel all the benefits for
themselves I hope to see some of you then.