Analytical Thinking: A Joke.

A colleague parent of mine from Richard’s Educational Toys is also a parent of a child in recovery from Autism. A jolly fellow, Richard sent me some jokes (below). In the darkness of meltdown mania, they touched me like a fresh sea breeze. Thank you Richard.

When interviewing staff, I always conclude by asking the applicant if they could share a joke or riddle. I use this technique to assess whether they can think on their feet, have they taken into account political sensitivities (any sexual, racial or ageist jokes and they score low on the interview) and what degree of analytical thinking surfs their brain while they are under pressure. But....I can never remember the great jokes I've been told over the years!

Richard’s jokes have provided me child appropriate fodder for getting Boy to analyze language and sub text of meaning. Boy loves a joke but his Asperger’s sense of humour ensures that he either describes the sense behind the joke prior to him asking us the riddle, or he repeats the joke umpteen dozen times until it is no longer funny!!!!!

For our next English homeschool unschooling, I’m going to sit by the pool and ask Boy all of the below riddles. I hope that from this one fun exercise we will move into searching the internet to discover the semantics and history behind the questions and answers.

Analytical thinking: what a joke. I LOVE it.

I wondered why the baseball was getting bigger....Then it hit me.

Police were called to a daycare where a three-year-old was....resisting a rest.

Did you hear about the guy whose whole left side was cut off? He's all right now.

The roundest knight at King Arthur's round table was....Sir Cumference.

The butcher backed up into the meat grinder and got a.....little behind in his work.

To write with a broken pencil is.....pointless.

When fish are in schools they sometimes take.....debate.

The dwarf fortune-teller who escaped from prison was a.....small medium at large.

A thief who stole a calendar got.....twelve months.

A thief fell and broke his leg in wet cement. He became....a hardened criminal.

Thieves who steal corn from a garden could be charged with...stalking.

We'll never run out of math teachers because they will....always multiply.

What do you see when the smog lifts in Los Angeles.....U C L A.

The math professor went crazy with the blackboard. He did.....a number on it.

The professor discovered that her theory of earthquakes was.....on shaky ground.

The dead batteries were given out.....free of charge.

If you take a laptop computer for a run you could......jog your memory.

A dentist and a manicurist fought.....tooth and nail.

What's the definition of a will?.....It's a dead giveaway.