Injecting Jest Into Your Course Tests
to Reduce Test Anxiety

Are you currently using humor in your tests? No? Most other instructors aren’t using it either. The challenge is using humor appropriately to reduce test anxiety and improve test performance, not to distract or annoy students or to decrease the validity and reliability of the test scores.

Research on this topic is reviewed to provide a perspective on humor’s effect. It is clear from the inverse correlations between test anxiety and performance that students with high test anxiety perform more poorly on all exams than their low-anxiety counterparts. How can humor in the test reduce test anxiety in order to improve overall performance? Participants brainstorm answers to this question before surveying the techniques reported in the literature.

Four major topics are addressed: (1) incongruous descriptors under test title, (2) jocular inserts in test directions, (3) humorous note on last page, and (4) humor in the test items. The bulk of the time is devoted to eight strategies for using humor in multiple-choice, matching, and constructed-response items. Content-irrelevant and content-relevant methods are covered. Participants generate humorous distractors and items for tests. Issues related to paper-based versus online administration are examined as they pertain to the various humor techniques. This session can make tests user friendly and significantly change students’ test anxiety and performance.

This topic is available as a 1–1.5 hour workshop.

To find out more, email Ed Leach or call (480) 705-8200, x233.