Monday, October 22, 2012

Nursery Rhyme Fun

Are you looking for a fun way to play with you baby, toddler, or preschooler?  Try teaching them a nursery rhyme.  Nursery rhymes are short, easy-to-remember, and often come with music or fingerplays that engage multiple learning styles.  Because they're fun, and offer variety of ways to play together, they've become a standard piece in our weekly storytimes.

 A lesser-known rhyme that is popular in my Babytime is Pizza, Pickle, Pumpernickel.

Pizza, Pickle, Pumpernickel
Pizza, pickle, pumperickel
My little gal (guy) shall have a tickle.
One for her (his) nose,
One for her (his) toes,
And one for her (his) tummy
Where the hot dog goes!

There are multiple ways you can enjoy this rhyme.  Bounce baby on your lap, tickling each body part as you say it.  Give a toddler a rattle or something else to shake, or clap to the rhyme.  Preschoolers can tap the out the rhythm with more sophisticated percussion instruments like sticks, bells, or tambourines.

Hickory, Dickory, Dock is another good bouncing rhyme.  Run your fingers up one arm and down the other, gently patting baby's head or nose or giving her a kiss or lift her up in the air for each dong of the clock's bell.  For a toddler, you can make your fingers run up one side of his body and down the other.  By the time a child is three he or she will enjoy taking over the mouse part.

Nursery rhymes that can be sung are especially appealing. There's something about a simple melody that helps us remember the words.  Other rhymes may be unfamiliar to parents, but everyone joins in when we sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star or Mary Had a Little Lamb. At the Dusenberry-River Library we usually end our nursery rhyme play by singing Do You Know the Muffin Man? Last week I overhead a small voice in our children's room singing Muffin Man while he worked on a puzzle.  He was oblivious to his audience, who probably found the tune swimming in their heads for the rest of the morning.

-Miss Meg

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