The Little Book of Thunks: 260 Questions to Make Your Brain Go Ouch!

An interesting book for setting thoughts running

Review of “The Little Book of Thunks”

This book introduces the idea of the use of questions posed through the spoken word that, at the conscious level may appear obvious and yet actually create a sense of confusion. This confusion enables the development of thinking, creativity and a deeper sense of questioning and inquisitiveness that allow new pathways within the mind to grow.

Ian Gilbert is a Professor of Philosophy and the book comes primarily from the development of children through the use of philosophical thinking through the posing of these questions. The book has two parts; a smaller proportion of the book is given over to an easy to read light introduction where he explains the origins of the Thunks, how they have been used, and some of the children’s responses; the majority of it (measured in terms of pages) is given over to the bank of 260 questions.

Reading the questions, I found that they were thought provoking and challenged the rationale and simplicity of their surface appearance and structure which can create an environment of discussion.

Bearing in mind that, for me, NLP is primarily the use of spoken language that allows another person to loosen their model of the world occurring at the conscious and/or the unconscious level. So, in my perception, there is some congruence and alignment between NLP and the subject of this book.

Whilst in the general development of creativity, thinking and thinking strategies, in the coaching context, the questions may not be useful as they stand and yet they offer some great foundations for the creation of some very useful coaching questions.