New book

So here's the story behind this book... My wife is an attorney, and she tells me that one of her law professors used to tell a "Joke of the Day." He would use it as a transition or to wake up the class or whatever. So she said I should try that in my classroom.

Yeah, well a middle school teacher faces a few extra challenges there. College classes meet two or three times a day for 16 weeks. Law professors can tell racy jokes, blonde jokes, religious jokes, death jokes... things I'm not comfortable telling to 12 year olds in my classroom.

But I tried it! The kids loved it. Until I ran out of jokes. It's a good time filler when three kids are still copying notes and you're about to lose the kids who are waiting. I also love telling the Joke of the Day right after someone leaves for the restroom. Next time maybe they'll go before class.

Since I didn't want to run out of jokes, I tracked down 180 jokes that I felt were appropriate for 8th graders, then wrote 'em all down. Then made a nice cover for them and put them on a print-on-demand website. Makes sense, right? You can view a preview of the book at its sales page. It's available in a print edition or as an e-book that you can download.