An English nursery rhyme, Old Mother Hubbard was first printed extensively in 1805 although the exact origins and date of creation are hotly disputed. The first printed version was titled The Comic Adventures of Old Mother Hubbard and her Dog and credited to Sarah Catherine Martin and accompanied by copper plate engravings. Although Old Mother …
Rub a Dub Dub is one of the earliest nursery rhymes that are still in circulation today, and its simplicity has caused it to endure across the decades whether singing it to a child at bedtime, or between children playing. The first recorded publication was in 1798 in Christmas Box but references to this song …
The Ants Go Marching is a light-hearted nursery rhyme that describes the ants’ actions as they march to get out of the rain. Like many other children’s songs such as Ten in the Bed, The Ants Go Marching helps children to learn how to count. The song can be accompanied by whole-body actions which include …
Peter Piper is a merry tongue-twister that uses alliteration to make the sentences tricky to pronounce. It was first published in 1813 in Peter Piper’s Practical Principles of Plain and Perfect Pronunciation. In this book, a tongue twister was published for every letter of the alphabet, but Peter Piper is the one that has endured. …
With a song about a dog and lots of clapping, what’s not to like? Perhaps this is the secret of the BINGO Song’s popularity as it’s been around for more than two centuries in one form or another. There is nothing really much to the song, but its fun repetitions and the fact it misses …
A Ram Sam Sam is an early 20th-century Moroccan children’s song that was originally written in Arabic before spreading to other parts of the world. Most of the lyrics are nonsense and don’t make any sense even in their original tongue. However, ” Guli” can mean “tell me” in Darija, the Moroccan dialect derived from …
Going on a Bear Hunt is a 1989 best-selling book by children’s author, Michael Rosen which was written after being inspired by an American folk song. It has gained popularity in modern times and has been translated into many languages. Michael Rosen was the 6th British Children’s Laureate and is famous for reciting children’s poetry. …
I’m a Little Teapot is a nursery rhyme which is perennially popular, thanks in part to the exaggerated but simple movements that accompany the words. It is a favorite of younger children who enjoy acting out the rhythms with their arms pretending to be the little teapot, bending one for the handle and outstretching the …
Are You Sleeping, Brother John? may sound familiar even if you’ve not heard the nursery rhyme before as it builds on an existing song structure from continental Europe instead of being derived from Britain or the USA. That’s because it’s an English translation of one of the most famous French nursery rhymes of all time, …
Johnny, Johnny, Yes Papa only emerged in written records in the 1980s, making it one of the newer nursery rhymes documented. However, there are personal accounts from both Kenya and India dating back a further 30-50 years, but these accounts cannot be fully substantiated due to the fact an identical song derived many years before …
