There’s no one in the world who can tell a good dad joke better than your dad (or your grandpa or your uncle). These cheesy puns and one-liners are the quintessential eye-rolling, family-friendly laughs that make everyone groan. They’re the kind of zingers that you can’t help but love (even though you’ll probably never admit it).

When does a joke become a dad joke? Typically, when it’s used by dads to teasingly embarrass their children. In fact, dad jokes are so effective in this respect that they’ve been dubbed a ‘weaponised anti-humour’ (Hye-Knudsen, 2020). They also have an affinity with masculine character traits such as the love of rough and tumble play, which fathers instinctively engage their children in since the dawn of our species.

A dad joke doesn’t have to be told by a dad; the term can also be applied to any type of one-liner, pun, or knock-knock joke. However, the key features of dad jokes are their simplicity and clever wordplay, so they’re an ideal way to get students laughing in the classroom.

As kids grow older, they develop a greater appreciation for jokes that use puns and other types of plays on words. As such, they’ll want to start telling their own dad jokes, and it can be a great way for them to practise their memorization and timing skills. They’ll be on the way to becoming the pun-kings of their generation in no time. best dad jokes