Nursery rhymes are fun and catchy for a simple reason; they are designed to teach children reading, reasoning, and verbal skills. Most children can recite Humpty Dumpty after hearing it just one time. There are several nursery rhyme activities you can participate in with your child as you teach them nursery rhymes.
Books are a great way to teach your child nursery rhymes. The Best Mother Goose Ever by Richard Scarry is a great book filled with nursery rhymes. There are several other great nursery rhyme books at your library that you can check out and have your child read.
A great nursery rhyme activity is to create nursery rhyme arts and crafts. Get a large piece of cardboard and have then cut out several stars from another piece of cardboard. Have your child paint the stars different colors and glue the stars to the other piece of cardboard. Allow your child to decorate the cardboard with other motifs from the nursery rhyme, “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.”
The nursery rhyme, “Itsy Bitsy Spider” is another great nursery rhyme to use for a nursery rhyme activity. Use a flat pan with white paint and a couple of marbles. Use a black piece of construction paper and place it in the pan. Now, have your child shake the pan and when the marbles rolls over the construction paper, it will create spider webs.
Some nursery rhymes focus on food, so prepare the type of that which is discussed in the nursery rhyme. If you have been reading Humpty Dumpty with your child, you can make a dessert or meal that uses eggs. Have your child break the eggs and drop them into the mixing bowl so they can participate in the nursery rhyme activity. The Muffin Man song is another cute nursery rhyme song that can be used to teach your child about the nursery rhyme and reality. Prepare some muffins in your home and have your child help prepare the muffins and recite the muffin man song while mixing the dough.
Another fun nursery rhyme activity you can play with your child is the matching game. Use items from several different nursery rhymes and have your child match the item to the correct nursery rhyme. For example, if your child has read “Jack Be Nimble”, you will want to get a candlestick and draw a picture of a boy jumping over a candlestick. When you play the matching game, your child will look for a candlestick and the picture of a boy jumping over the candlestick in order to properly match them up.
Puzzles are a great way to help your child learn their nursery rhymes. You can purchase nursery rhyme puzzles and have your child recite the nursery rhyme as they are putting it together. When they are building the puzzle, you should ask them questions about the nursery rhyme. For example, if they are building a puzzle based on the nursery rhyme, “Three Kittens Mittens”, you can ask “How many mittens do the kittens have?”
Another fun nursery rhyme activity you can play with your child is “guess the animal”. In order to play this game, you will select animals from various nursery rhymes and give clues to your child about the animal. Your child must then identify the animal and the appropriate nursery rhyme. For example, if you are using the nursery rhyme, “Mary had a Little Lamb”, you could describe the lamb to your child and give clues about the rhyme. Some of the clues could be things like “My owner is a little girl that loves me” or “I look like the snow.”