When I was teaching, it always surprised me how many students were unfamiliar with nursery rhymes and movement songs. These types of activities are engaging and a great way to be silly and fun with your little ones while playing a massive role in developing language skills, the brain, and physical coordination.
The language in nursery rhymes entertains children. When children hear the similarities and differences of the words, they are paying attention to phonemes. Hearing these sounds is the beginning of understanding how words are put together. As well, the sing-song way we share nursery rhymes in hopefully very expressive. This is an introduction to inflection, pitch, tone, and cadence. Once children are familiar with the words, they will begin to repeat after you, which builds vocabulary.
Often children will ask for something they enjoy to be repeated over and over and over. Repetition can be significant for their brains! Repetitions builds memory skills. Also, as you are repeating the rhyme, watch the glee they experience as you come to their favourite part. This is your child learning to make predictions!
(Personal Story: When my granddaughter was around a year old, a friend of ours showed her the bouncing rhyme This Is the Way the Ladies Ride. She loved it! She giggled and laughed and kept indicating for more! Her connection to the song and the fun became even more apparent when she saw our friend again months later. She was not talking yet, so at first, we were not sure what she wanted, but what she wanted to be bounced.)
When presenting nursery rhymes, there is often a physical component that builds gross and fine motor skills. One of my favourites is The Hokey Pokey, which is an excellent example of a movement song that develops gross motor skills. Another favourite is The Itsy Bitsy Spider! When a child does the actions to this song, fine motor skills are at work.
I could go on and on, but the best way to see the benefits is experience!
Check out these YouTube links for Nursery rhymes and song play to entertain your littles ones:
Well said Mindy! This is exactly what we learned in Early Childhood Education! Repetition is sooooo important!
I did this little piggie with Preston yesterday and even at 5 years old it got him laughing so hard!
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