From Baa Baa Black Sheep to I'm a Little Teapot, nursery rhymes have been used for ages as a way for adults to engage their children. It turns out, these simple poems and songs actually pack quite a punch in helping your child develop and learn! Read on to discover the benefits of practicing rhymes with your little one.
- Memory: Nursery rhymes can also help with memory development, as the repetitive nature of the rhymes makes them easier to remember. This can help your child develop their short-term memory skills.
- Social-Emotional Development: Singing nursery rhymes can be a fun bonding experience between you and your child, helping to build a strong emotional connection.
- Literacy Skills: Nursery rhymes can also help your child develop early literacy skills by introducing them to the rhythms and patterns of language, which will be important when they learn to read. Rhyming is an essential literacy skill because it allows the reader to detect sound patterns that enable faster decoding.
- Cognitive Development: The repetitive nature of nursery rhymes can also help your child develop their cognitive skills, as they learn to anticipate what comes next in the rhyme. Being able to make predictions is an important thinking skill!
- Language Development - When you repeat nursery rhymes often, your child will eventually catch on and try to sing along themselves. Any type of practice that encourages your child to exercise saying words and learning vocabulary is a step in the right direction when it comes to this area of development.
How to Expose Your Child to Nursery Rhymes
- Get a book of nursery rhymes - Every child should have a nice, big classic book of nursery rhymes on their bookshelf! It's perfect to pull out on a night when storytime needs to run short.
- Sing to your child - Sing to or with your child whenever there's a bit of downtime and the mood strikes, such as in the car, on a walk, or while doing something routine together, like brushing their hair. Quick, simple songs like The Itsy Bitsy Spider and Twinkle Twinkle Little Star are great for encouraging your child to sing along!
- Use audio experiences - As with singing, listening to nursery rhymes through audio experiences is a wonderful way to expose your child to the benefits of rhymes and repetition. Let Storypod help you out with a screen-free option through Crafties such as Sleepi Sheep and Uma Unicorn!
Overall, singing nursery rhymes can be a fun and engaging way to support your child's early development, helping to lay the foundation for future learning and success.
