No Laughing Matter

So I know that I usually work on teaching the kids technical things like reading, math, and science, but in my quest to make happy, healthy, and well-rounded kids, one aspect of learning can’t be ignored – the sense of humor.  I believe that being able to laugh at yourself and just laugh and have fun with others is equally as important as getting good grades to being happy and successful in life. 

Briana somehow has decided that she’s really funny.  Her big joke goes like this, “Mommy, do you want me to tell you a funny joke?  Ok.  Cock-a-doodle-doo-doo will there be enough room.”  Followed by a fit of giggles and and echo of the exact same joke told by Abigail.  All day long.  Anytime I don’t laugh Briana will ask me, “Mommy why didn’t you laugh?  That joke is funny.”  The joke is a play on words from a book she loves called Chicka Chicka Boom Boom which says, “Chicka Chicka Boom Boom.  Will there be enough room?”  The first time she deliberately switched the words to Cock-a-doodle-doo-doo it was kind-of funny.  We’re coming up on the millionth telling of that joke and we need to expand her repertoire.

In addition to retiring the current joke, there are multiple other benefits to helping the kids learn some jokes.  We’ve all heard that laughter is the best medicine, and it’s true.  Laughter can strengthen your immune system, diminish pain, protect you from stressing out, boost your energy, connect you to others, release inhibitions and defensiveness, inspire hope, and just be good old-fashioned fun.  In fact, I’ve read that babies can only process either good or bad stimulation at once so if you make them laugh while, say, bandaging up a cut, the baby will literally not feel you applying peroxide to clean the cut.  No clue when that ability goes away, but it strengthens my belief in the benefits of laughing.  I’ve also read that laughing actually relaxes your muscles even as an adult, so there is a benefit to hitting the gym with a friend. 

The study of laughing is actually called gelotology.  You know that Jello-tology made you laugh.  Why I always find that word funny, I’ll never know.  Anyway, this week we’re going to be gelotologists and learn about laughing and laugh along the way.

As gelotologists, I tell the kids that we laugh at jokes for 3 reasons:

1.     The incongruity theory – This is when logic or familiarity are replaced by something that isn’t supposed to go there.  That’s why the Cock-a-doodle-doo-doo joke is funny to us.

2.     The superiority theory – This is when we laugh at someone else’s mistakes or misfortune.  I tell the kids that this is bad laughing.  We never laugh at other people.  They can learn the America’s Funniest Home Videos person getting kicked theory of joke elsewhere.

3.     The relief theory – This is where we laugh to break tension.  This is actually what movie writers use to build the tension, break the tension a little with a joke so they can build it up again.  If they didn’t break the tension a little bit, you would actually hate watching suspenseful movies by the end and may even feel nauseous, overwhelmed, or other physical symptoms watching them.  Briana adds that “’How To Train Your Dragon’ does get very scary but sometimes Hiccup makes you laugh so you don’t get too scared”, and she’s right.

People tend to prefer one of these types of jokes, but depending on the situation can laugh at all three.  When I think about it, I do tend to prefer the incongruous joke most.  I actually can’t stand watching America’s Funniest Home Videos and the like because I spend the whole time thinking, “What’s wrong with that kids’ parents?  They’re videoing and laughing while their child tumbles backwards off a bike!  Why aren't they running over and helping him?!”  I think everyone likes tension breaking jokes though, but hey, others may think everyone likes watching someone get kicked in the pants, so maybe some people hate hearing jokes when they’re stressed.

I ask the kids if they’ve heard any jokes that they think are funny other than the Cock-A-Doodle-Doo-Doo one.  Abby says “I know a funny joke” and runs off.  She comes back with the magnetic vehicle kitchen toy, where if you put a train front and a car back into the toy, it will sing, “You put a train in front, a car behind.  Put them together and what do you find?  A train-car!  That’s silly!  A train-car…it won’t go.”  Abby takes this joke at face value.  They said “that’s silly” so it must be.  Every time she pushes the toy and the song comes on, she giggles and says, “train-car is so silly!”  Briana on the other hand is critical of facts, so she doesn’t laugh at all.  Instead she asks me, “Mommy, why would a train-car not go?”  I asked her why she thought it wouldn’t go.  “You have to think about it.  If you have the train-car ride on the train tracks then the car and the train would be fine so it could go on a train track.  And you would have the car’s GPS so the train would know where to go.  So I think they’re wrong.  Abby that’s not silly.  A train-car will go if you put it on a train track.”  I find this hilarious but I also realize that it’s going to be harder to get my very analytical 3 year old to come up with some jokes.  Don’t get me wrong, she’s a relaxed and silly kid, but she does tend to think things through first and then emote (oh if I could only have that quality since I tend to emote first then think J !)

I decide to try the silliests kid joke that I know-

“Why did the Mommy throw the butter?  She wanted to see the butterfly.”

Briana replied, “Why were you doing that?  Does a butterfly come from butter and then a caterpillar and then into a butterfly?”  When I told her no, it’s just a joke that’s playing on the word butter sounding like butterfly, she told me, “Mommy, no throwing food.  Go clean it up.”  Strike two with her.  Abby giggled and said “Mommy throwing butterfly.”

I try another-

“What did one volcano say to another?  I lava you.”

Briana shook her head and said, “No they don’t.  Volcanoes don’t have mouths.  Do another joke.”  Abby didn’t get that one.

Strike 3.  Clearly we need a new format. 

I know that Briana finds potty humor funny.  Anytime she can work “pee pee” into a sentence she cracks up.  Awesome while Abby’s moving out of her Pull-ups and there’s a lot of potty talk in the house.  I’m trying not to encourage the potty jokes.

I decide to work on the old favorite – the Knock-Knock joke – and see if this type of incongruous joke is going to tickle her funny bone.  Abby takes to it right away and comes up with her own version, “Knock. Knock.  Who’s there?  It’s a Abby.  Abby juice.”  A pretty good joke for a two year old.  Bree does think these are funny, but she studies the joke like a technician and makes sure to get all of the words just right.  I think that she needs a more unexpected joke that catches her off guard.

So I try things that are just plain silly.  Socks for gloves – hilarious fun for Abby, odd and impractical to Briana.

Poor Abby.  Only silly pictures of her in the blog today.

Eventually I find out what tickles Briana.  I guess it would fall into the superiority category although not in the sense of making fun of others.  Briana finds it hilarious if you either misuse a word in an obvious way or insert a word that she knows to be gibberish into a sentence.  Abigail is the one who really figured this out.  When she doesn’t know a word, she inserts the word “tompomp”, and I notice that Briana cracks up every time Abby says, “I got the tompomp”. 

Briana giggling with her cousin when they figured out they could hide under the cushion of their great-grandmother's swing

While I’ve focused thus far on teaching the kids to laugh at jokes, we are also working on learning to laugh at ourselves a little bit this week.  I was terrible at laughing at myself until I met my husband.  I always took myself, and what I was doing, really seriously, even though my Dad is a notorious prankster. 

We are working on not crying when we don’t get our way right now with the girls, so this week I tell them that instead of crying, let’s laugh.   Abby took your toy, just laugh and find something funny about that.  Briana agrees that, “Abby running off with her mischief smile is funny because I already know who took it and Abby thinks I don’t know where it is.”  Now, go get it back.  Isn’t that better than crying and not getting what you want?  I don’t add that it’s much better on my ears.  This strategy works for stuff that Briana doesn’t care too much about.  When, however, Abby put on Briana’s Princess Aurora (Sleeping Beauty) dress and tiara, nothing was funny about that at all.  You win some, you lose some.

Remember, you don’t have to want your kids to be stand-up comedians to nurture their need for and love of laughing.  Spend some time being silly with the kiddies.  Nothing builds a relationship like having a nice belly laugh together – and that’s no joke.

<3 Pedigreed Housewife