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Jape's joke time
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You raise your hand and most of the other children do the same.

"Brilliant!" says Professor Jape, "How about this one."

"What's the noisiest pet?"

You and the other students look politely blank faced.

"A trumpet!" says Jape with a laugh. "D'you get it? Trum-pet? Eh?"

"I like that one!" you whisper to Kensley.

"Ok children, next one:

"What kind of key opens a banana? Come on, any guesses? No?

"A monkey! You know: a mon-key! A mon key? No? Oh you lot are hopeless."

"I like bananas" Kensley whispers to you.

"Right next one. What's the tastiest table?" shouts out Professor Jape thoroughly enjoying himself now. "A vegtable! Ha ha ha ha! A veg-table"

A few groans and shouts of laughter in the room.

"What room has no doors! A mushroom!"

"Right, listen to this." Jape continues. "One day a baby was born, a lovely little baby, and his mum and dad were over the moon. He was a perfectly normal, happy little baby except for one thing - he had a belly button made out of solid gold.

Well the doctors looked at it but they had never seen anything like it before. Don't worry, they told the parents, he's a healthy little chap and the golden belly button doesn't seem to be doing any harm.

Now as this boy grew up he became curious about this golden belly button of his. Why did he have it? What did it mean? Why was it golden? He asked everyone he could but no-one knew: not his teachers at school, not the chief of police, not even the top professors at Oxbridge university. But one day he heard about the wisest man in the world who lived at the top of the tallest mountain far away in the Himalayas.

So got an aeroplane all the way to India, a bus to the foot of the mountain, a donkey halfway up the mountain, and from there he had to walk, hour after hour in the freezing cold, until he was high above the clouds but still he wasn't at the top. Finally though he reached the top and on the peak was a beautiful temple and sitting in the middle of the temple with his eyes closed was an old man with a great white beard reaching down to his knees.

Oh wisest man, said the boy, can you tell me why I have this golden belly button? And the wise old man opened his eyes in wonder and said for many years have I waited for this moment. And from a chain around his neck he held up a golden key. This golden key was exactly the same colour golden as the boy's golden belly button.

The wise old man put the gold key into the golden belly button and it fitted perfectly. Slowly he turned the key.

Then... the boy's bum fell off."

Professor Jape bursts into uncontrollable high pitched giggling and some of the other children laugh too.

"His bum, it fell right off!" shrieked Professor Jape. "He went all that way and then his bum fell off! Oh that's a good one that is!"

"Right children," says Jape. "That's all we've got time for in this lesson. I hope you had a good laugh, I know I did. See you next time."