Studies show that nursery rhymes, while sometimes outdated, help with building memory, vocabulary, numeracy, and speaking skills.

Nursery Rhymes are still important

Chances are, when you were a child, you were taught nursery rhymes at play school or home. Without knowing it, those rhymes taught you to listen and speak, move and dance, count, understand rhythm and rhyme scheme and be creative.

Nursery rhymes provide bite-sized learning opportunities for young children to develop key developmental skills, leading to hours of play and make-believe. 

They are a powerful learning source in early literacy and enable children to become interested in the rhythm and patterns of language. Consider the repetition and alliteration of “A Sailor Went to Sea Sea Sea” and Tisket, Tasket, the rhyme in “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”, the hand actions of Itsy Bitsy Spider – all engaging the brain and senses. The repetition in nursery rhymes supports the development of memory and kickstarts the practice of listening and speaking.

What about the darker rhymes?

You can weed out the rhymes you feel are too dark or inappropriate.  We never sang Georgie Porgie Pudding Pie, because I felt it normalised a boy kissing girls without their consent and making them cry.  Maybe that was too deep, but I didn’t like singing it.  Some people don’t like Ring a Ring a Rosies because it’s apparantly about death in the Bubonic plague, but for me the lyrics are not disturbing, so we sang it.  Pick the ones you like and make up your own.

Classic nursery rhymes

Start with the classics.  You can leave out words you don’t like but don’t worry about old fashioned words like shillings and parlour and maids-a-waiting.  It’s a good idea to introduce new words to your children.

The Indestructibles Range (see above) is perfect as an introduction to very small chidlren -and they can be taken everywhere!

Classic Nursery Rhymes illustrated by Dorothy M Wheeler, with a foreward by Chris Riddel.

And The Jackie Morris Book of Classic Nursery Rhymes.

Shirley Hughes’ Round and Round the Garden: A First Book of Nursery Rhymes is beautifully illustrated.  Otherwise look for books that have a selection of the nursery rhymes you love.

Here’s a print out of the words to the most popular nursery rhymes which you can print out and teach your children.

African Nursery Rhymes

I do think it’s important to look to our own heritage and combine British nursery rhymes with home grown ones. The strong oral tradition in African culture lends itself to nursery rhymes.

The African Nursery Rhymes book has a collection of 55 nursery rhymes, especially reworked and adapted for South African children. 

Seven ways to play with nursery rhymes

Make repeating nursery rhymes a fun activity.  Here are 7 easy ways to introduce nursery rhymes into your home.

1. Start young. Buy nursery rhyme books and choose your favourite rhyme to begin with.  Keep singing it as you do an activity, such as bathing or eating, or walking. We used to sing “This is the way we wash our face, wash our face, wash our face…early in the morning… ”  Try it out!
2. Repeat and repeat and repeat. Make a point of singing rhymes 2 or 3 times each day.
3. Share picture books of rhymes with your children and encourage them to talk about the characters and the activities in the rhyme.
4. Use actions and facial expressions to make rhyming sessions fun-filled and entertaining.
5. Sing along. Once your children know the nursery rhymes, encourage them to sing along. This will help them to memorise the rhymes and to sing on their own.
6.  Watch videos too. Children love animated nursery rhymes and they will watch and learn the songs quickly. While we prefer books, we know children are going to watch videos, so they may as well watch something fun and educational.
7. Encourage your children to make up their own rhymes. Dress up and act out the lines.  Have fun!

To understand more about the importance of nursery rhymes, watch this. 

I grew up with Des and Dawn Lindburg’s much-loved songs and rhymes with a wonderful South African flavour. My favourite was Unicorns, Spiders and Things. Listen to the album here.

“Experts in literacy and child development have discovered that if children know eight nursery rhymes by heart by the time they’re four years old, they’re usually among the best readers by the time they’re eight.”
Mem Fox, Reading Magic.