“Rhymers will be readers; it’s that simple. Experts in literacy and child development have discovered that if children know
eight nursery rhymes by heart by age four, they’re usually among the best readers by the time they’re eight!”
– Mem Fox, author Reading Magic
I am living proof that this Mem Fox quote is true. A few years ago, I was posting a book on the Book Fairy Pantry Project Facebook page because I loved the book’s title and the beautiful cover. It was called, Read To Your Baby Every Day: 30 Classic Nursery Rhymes To Read Aloud. I started turning pages to see which nursery rhymes were included in this collection. By the end of the book, I was stunned to realize I not only knew, but could still recite every one of them! It suddenly dawned on me that I now had the answer to something I had questioned for years.
How did I, a child who had no books, who had not been read to, who didn’t attend a nursery school or even kindergarten, enter first grade and still be full on reading by the end of that first school year? The answer lay in Mem Fox’s words “Rhymers will be readers; it’s that simple.” I had to have learned those 30 nursery rhymes before I started school. In spite of being born into poverty and having a complete lack of print in our home, I entered first grade with a wealth of rhyming skills. Thank you, Mom! Sadly, my mom had already passed when I made this discovery. If I could ask her just one question, I would ask, “How did it come to be that you taught so many rhymes to me?”
This new discovery prompted me to immediately begin researching the connection between rhyming and reading. One article I read was written by a teacher who reported that she began to notice that every child she worked with who struggled with reading also had low rhyming skills. As I learned more and more about how rhyming and singing lay the foundation for learning to read, I began to understand why nursery rhymes have always been such an important part of early childhood.
Fast forward to today. Now, in our post-pandemic family literacy epidemic, one in four homes have no books at all. Many babies will likely have fewer books. This means we will need other ways to provide that early literacy foundation required to one day successfully learn to read. My goal in writing about the importance of rhyming with babies is to give new parents another resource for growing book babies. One of the ways parents and caregivers can give babies the best shot at literacy, without an abundance of books, is by singing and saying as many nursery rhymes and songs to babies and young children as we can every day. For babies and young children, the three R’s are rhythm, rhyme, and yes…the dreaded repetition.
When parents and caregivers have even one book of nursery rhymes, and they read and sing them to babies every day, they will be gifting them with the skill of rhyming. I agree that some of the old nursery rhymes are better left behind. Young children don’t need to hear about disabled mice getting their tails chopped with knives, but they do need to hear, again and again, songs and rhymes like “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” “Pat-A Cake, Pat-A Cake,” “Row, Row, Row Your Boat,” “Wheels on the Bus,” “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes,” “This Little Piggy,” “Itsy Bitsy Spider,” and “You Are My Sunshine.”
Those are the first eight I thought of, but parents can choose any songs or rhymes that will be fun for them in any language. I don’t speak French but I learned to sing “Frère Jacques” as a small child. One lovely tradition I read about was families choosing a song for each child, at birth, that becomes that child’s own special song. It can be a well-known song or one created just for that child. The song is learned by all family members and is sung to the child throughout childhood.
Many songs and rhymes are passed down from generation to generation. Those rhymes my mom taught me are the ones that I taught my children and grandchildren. If you don’t already know many nursery rhymes you can learn them along with your babies by reading them again, and again, and again or by listening to them together on CD. I was very excited when I learned that the beloved children’s singer, Raffi, and Lindsay Munroe, have a CD called Nursery Rhymes for Kinder Times. They are much sweeter do-overs of well-known nursery rhymes written by kindergarten teacher, Pam Gittleman.
What if you have a baby AND a four-year-old who doesn’t already know eight or even any nursery rhymes by heart? Now is a perfect time to start! The best place I know to get nursery rhyme support with your babies and young ones is at your local library. You can borrow nursery rhyme books and, best of all, you can stay for story time and learn nursery rhymes together. Learning nursery rhymes by heart is a powerful way to start raising readers.
About the Book
Please Read To Me is a multicultural, bilingual book that shows parents, grandparents, siblings, and caregivers the joys and benefits of bonding with babies and young children by reading to them. Featuring beautiful illustrations donated by Maine artists, the story is a child’s plea for love and literacy. The rhyming text makes it fun to read aloud and young children enjoy the humorous and bright illustrations that reveal the whole story.
In addition to being an ideal birth and baby shower gift, Please Read To Me is a dynamic family literacy advocacy tool. The board book version ofPlease Read to Me was a recipient of two Stephen and Tabitha King Foundation grants and was distributed to Maine babies and children in 2021 and 2023. Find your free poster and family literacy resources at BookFairyPantryProject.org. All sales of this book support family literacy through the Book Fairy Pantry Project, a nonprofit initiative of Kindred World.
Now available in bookstore everywhere.
Support Pam’s nonprofit work, and receive a discount, by purchasing Please Read To Me directly from her.
Buy Through International Booksellers: