Hey, Diddle, Diddle and Other Best-loved Rhymes

Gerlings, R., & Weber, P. (2009). Hey diddle diddle: and other best-loved rhymes. New York: Alphabet Soup ; Windmill Books.

This children's book is very neat because it has ten well known nursery-rhymes in one book. It contains the following:

• Hey, Diddle, Diddle
• Old King Cole
• Pussy-Cat, Pussy-Cat
• It's Raining, It's Pouring
• Hush, Little Baby
• Ding, Dong, Bell
• One, Two, Buckle My Shoe
• Pat-A-Cake
• Jack Sprat
• Star Light, Star Bright

I am only going to discuss a couple of the nursery rhymes but I wanted to be sure that each one was listed. "Hey, Diddle, Diddle" shows an example of ASSONANCE in the nursery rhyme because it shares words with similar vowel sounds like diddle, fiddle, spoon, and moon. "Hush, Little Baby" is a lullaby that is often used to put sweet little ones to sleep but it has a good example of REPETITION in it. "Hush, little baby, don't say a word, Papa's going to buy you a mockingbird, and if that mocking bird won't sing, Papa's going to buy you a diamond ring..." The lullaby goes on with "And if that ________ won't _________, Papa's going to buy you a ________" It is soothing but easy to understand because there is that constant repetition of the basic verses. RHYMING is also a key ingredient to successful nursery rhymes and is found in just about all of the ones within this book but is very easily seen in "One, Two, Buckle My Shoe". This is also a good rhyme to help students start counting and would be very convenient because instead of buckling a shoe they could tie the shoe, and they could knock on the door after three and four, etc...or you could have small students draw what each number and then phrase after the number looks like. It would be very easy to use this in an K-2 math class.