Matthew Syed, What Do you Think? How to Agree to Disagree and Still Be Friends, Wren & Rook, November 2022, 192 pp., RRP $22.99 (pbk), ISBN 9781526364937
The ancient arts of discourse – rhetoric, grammar and logic – were once important means to social improvement, education and democracy. In our modern age of fake news, cancel culture and selective outrage, the absence of these arts couldn’t be more evident. In What Do You Think? How to Disagree and Still Be Friends, Matthew Syed (bestselling author of You Are Awesome) distils the essential skills for positive debate into funny, digestible bites for kids.
The book covers topics such as jumping to conclusion vs. critical thinking, influences, investigating sources of information, social media and healthy debate using real-world examples as well as hilarious anecdotes alongside bold illustrations. Syed encourages readers to engage in a debate first from one side of the argument, and then from the opposite point of view, to consider other points of view and to avoid echo chambers.
The text is written for a British audience, so some of the jokes may not be understood by Australian readers, but for the most part it is easy to read and succinct.
I highly recommend What Do You Think? How to Disagree and Still Be Friends for readers 10+. It would make a useful classroom resource for upper primary and lower secondary schools.
Reviewed by Pamela Ueckerman
