Memorizing nursery rhymes is not only a delightful, shared experience between parent and child, but it is an easy and powerful way to develop phonemic awareness and build the oral language foundation necessary for excellence in reading, writing, and speaking.

Teaching children songs and rhymes was once just an intuitive part of wise, caring parenting. The young child was engaged in language play throughout the day, from rhythmic knee bouncing chants to soothing lullabies. Unfortunately, some parents have forgotten the importance of passing on these oral language traditions. A gentle reminder is in order. We can encourage parents to engage their children in memorizing familiar nursery rhymes during the summer before kindergarten begins and throughout the year. We can provide them with copies of class favorites. Parents need to know that the year begins with Mother Goose rhymes and the children will all have many opportunities to perform rhymes before appreciative audiences. Perhaps there will even be a Mother Goose recital, where children dress up and take turns reciting their favorite rhymes using their most articulate, expressive voices.

Please give parents copies of your versions of familiar rhymes. An inexpensive audio tape of the rhymes recited with memorable rhythm and syntax is available for you, with permission to make copies for parents. You may consider making your own Mother Goose rhyme tape as a gift for children and their families. Many families will appreciate hearing the nursery rhymes “well said.”

Parents are partners with us in literacy development and it is appropriate to say, “We know you want your child to be a good reader, so enjoy learning these nursery rhymes.” Or “Just in case your child doesn’t know all these rhymes, I’ve included the words for you, and even an audio tape.”

Children can chant nursery rhymes while riding in the car, walking down the road, or picking up toys. It only takes a few minutes a day. We can help parents re-establish the family tradition of enriching their child’s life with delightful language. Learning just one or two new rhymes each week will support the child’s ability to hear and play with sounds.

As an added bonus, the more we help a child memorize delightful rhymes, the stronger their memorizing skills grow — and that’s a powerful gift for lifelong learning.  Give children the familiarity with language that will allow their decoding to be error free and their reading to be fluent. I love the quote from Robert Frost, “Pretty things well said, it’s nice to have them in your head.”

Nellie Edge, 2002