Gilda Schindler

Sf. Vasile School

Ploiesti, Romania

Songs and Rhymes in Primary School Classes

Each human society is based on poetry and music elements. They can reveal many aspects
of its culture: the faith, the relationship between us and our past and ancestors, the anxieties, the
hopes and the view of the future. These elements have an immanent power- they can give energy or
to change people’s mood. We know that music and poetry occur in all moments of our life, from
birth to death. So they have an important role in the process of learning a foreign language, they
contribute a lot in developing speaking and listening skills, pronunciation practice.
The importance of using rhymes and songs in teaching English as a secondary language in
the primary school is huge. Since English is a complicated language with exceptions seemingly to
almost every rule of grammar, primary school pupils face a multitude of problems.

Advantages of using songs, stories and nursery rhymes in our lessons

Using these idioms in our lessons helps a lot. Traditional songs, stories and nursery rhymes
in our classroom can create an excellent learning experience. They have a great cultural value and
provide the occasion to deal with the cultural background of our lessons. Learnig this authentic
material pupils get to know parts of a foreign culture. This can satisfy chindren’s natural curiosity
and can increase the desire to learn something new. Being familiar with songs and rhymes in a
foreign language, children feel closer to the foreign culture and its language. If they hear the same
melody or a similar rhyme they can discover a parallel between their own culture and the foreign
one, they won’t be frightenig but interested to study that language and its culture. This is an
important contribution to the development of tolerance and open-mindedness.

Children grow up with these songs and rhymes and develop their first language by them.
They are the first experinced parts of communication in their mother tongue. They like to lisen and
react to nursery rhymes. These materials offer an intimate feeling, a special connection with their
human environment. The following characteristics also support foreign language acquisition:
• Music, rhythm and rhymes produce a positive live feeling
• They motivate to learn and be active
• They reduce children’s inhibition, even if they don’t understand the words
• Rhythm allows a fluent learning of vocabulary and structure

All the teachers want high motivated pupils in learning. But their motivation depends on the
teaching methods and the teacher’s personality. If we, as ESL (English as Secondary Language)
teachers, often use these materials, our pupils become more relaxed, we can offer to our students
different forms of organize our class, we provide by them fun and action. It is well known the fact
that learning with fun increase the progress of our activity. Even shy or slow learning children are
given encouragement by singing and speaking in choir and so they feel able to speak in a foreign
language(Songs and Rhymes in Teaching English at Primary School- Simone Luck, Nicole
Sonnenberg, Volker Geyer, 2001).
If the children enjoy the learning activities, they will be more involved and this may increase
their desire to continue. This is very positive for language learning, because if children want to
continue with an activity for some time, it will give them more exposure to language input and
more chance to practice the language. They will also develop more positive attitudes towards
English as they will associate it with something enjoyable and pleasing.
Songs, stories and nursery rhymes provide the opportunity for students to internalize some
linquistis structures. Words in songs and rhymes are meaningful to the pupil, which influences the
aquisition in a positive way. In general, we use a lot of repetitions in caonversational language.
Therefore songs, stories and nursery rhymes stick in the child’s mind.
Children, in their inner structure, use a variety of strategies to learn English. They’ve got the
ability to make use of ready-made phrases of English. These are sometimes called chunks of
language because they are learnt and used in speech as whole phrases. For exemple, we can develop
an entire activity based upon the chunks discovered in Twinkle, Twinkle, little star. Here, there is a
repetitive linquistic structure:

Twinkle, twinkle, little star

How I wonder what you are.
(British Children’s Songs, Action Songs and Nursery Rhymes, Jackie Reilly-1 Week course
for European Teachers of English at Primary Level, Shrewsbury, 2- 10 oct 2010)

Children may not have been taught this chunk formally, but it helps them to communicate
when they have very little language. Later they may begin to break down these phrases and
recombine the words in new way. For the example, in the beginning a child may use only the
phrase: I wonder what you are. Later she/he may begin to realise that this can be combined with
other bits of language: Now I wonder what you are, Then I wonder what you are. Later she/he begin
to change other parts of the phrase, eg I know what you are; I see what you are; I wonder who you
are. After a while, as a upper stage, they may be aware of changing the verb according to the
subject: I wonder what I am, I wonder what he is.
It is useful to observe when children begin to break down a phrase in this way as this is a
sign of language development. We can help to encourage this by using in our activities songs,
stories and nursery rhymes.

Another advantage of using these kinds of materials in our lessons is the fact that provides
support for phonetic development. They give a feeling for the rhythm of the spoken language.
Many well-known rhymes make use of iambic parameter, the natural rhythm of the English
language (Songs and Rhymes in Teaching English at Primary School- Simone Luck, Nicole
Sonnenberg, Volker Geyer, 2001). Practising intonation through reciting rhymes and poems is
mostly funny and effective. Singing songs can also help the pupils to learn vocabulary and gain
fluency.
Sometimes we can vary that boring pronunciation teaching and relpace it by rhythmic
chants. For example, The animals’ chant:
Come on, girls! What is it?
Come on, boys! What that noise?
Sit down, please! It’a dog!
What that noise? Look, boys and girls!
(Big Bugs 1-Elisenda Papiol, Maria Toth, Carol Read, Ana Soberon, , Macmillan, 2009)
By using music in our classroom, our pupils have the opportunity to practice their listening
skills and increase their cultural knowledge. Almost any song can be used in our classroom.
Popular, folk music can be employed in the same way as children’s rhymes.
 The pronunciation and rhythm lessons are the same as for the children's songs and the
lessons may help students become more interested in different types of music. Some children shy
away from the traditional popular music of a culture because it is difficult (often, even for the native
speaker) for them to understand the words.
Practicing lyric reading, studying the vocabulary, and listening to various songs can help
students become more familiar with popular music and make them more confident in their ability to
listen and understand the world around them. Traditional songs can also be used in grammar,
vocabulary, and pronunciation exercises. Songs can also be used to start cultural lessons about
particular historical events or traditions in an area of the world.
For example, London bridge is falling down give us the opportunity to discuss with our
pupils some aspects related with a historical period from Great Britain- Middle Ages, when the
inhabitants decided to make some bridges over Thames. This is a well-known traditional nursery
rhymes which is found in different versions all over the world.
London Bridge is falling down,
Falling down, falling down.
London Bridge is falling down,
My fair lady!
(British Children’s Songs, Action Songs and Nursery Rhymes, Jackie Reilly-1 Week course
for European Teachers of English at Primary Level, Shrewsbury, 2- 10 oct 2010)

Ways of using songs, stories and nursery rhymes in our activities

a) The repetitive nature of most children's songs and rhymes help students learn
vocabulary and the rhythm of the language. "Old MacDonald had a Farm" is an example of
a song that repeats itself. The type of animal and the sound each animal makes changes but
the rest of the lyrics remain the same. Anyone learning the song should be able to memorize
the lyrics very quickly.

Old MacDonald had a farm, eee-yi-eee-yi-oh

And on this farm he had a cow, eee-yi-eee-yi-oh
With a moo moo here and a moo moo there
Here a moo, there a moo, everywhere a moo moo
Old Mac Donald had a farm, eee-yi-eee-yi-oh
(British Children’s Songs, Action Songs and Nursery Rhymes, Jackie Reilly-1 Week course
for European Teachers of English at Primary Level, Shrewsbury, 2- 10 oct 2010)

To make a lesson more challenging, a copy of the song or rhyme with words missing can be
given to the students. The song can be played and the students can fill in the missing words. This
helps with listening comprehension, writing, reading and spelling.
The words the teacher chooses to leave off the page may change depending on the lesson. If
adjectives are the topic of a lesson, the adjectives may be left out of the song or rhyme so a student
can fill them in when it is played for the class. The difficulty of the lesson can be changed by the
type of song or rhyme chosen and that words are omitted.

b) The children should be encouraged to learn and use English not only during the lessons,
but also during the various activities. In the early stages, it is difficult to get the learners to use the
language for their own needs. Young learners' interest derives mostly from the pleasure given them
by a particular activity, so we may encourage, as teachers, the class to exchange news, tell stories,
compose little plays and imaginary conversations.
 c) The learners can also try to compose their own songs and rhymes. Even young learners
can fairly quickly learn to write their own jingles. This is a creative way of using these materials
and it surely increase the imaginative potential of our students. For example, we can use in the
beginning of our activity one of the songs we’ve studied in a previous lesson: Noak’s Ark. (British
Children’s Songs, Action Songs and Nursery Rhymes, Jackie Reilly-1 Week course for European
Teachers of English at Primary Level, Shrewsbury, 2- 10 oct 2010)
The original lyrics were:

Now in came the animals, two by two/ The hippopotamus and the kangaroo.

The pupils can change the text and to use terms from another theme- My clothes:

Now on put my troussers, leg by leg/ My beautiful scarf and my purple hat.

d) Many rhymes and songs are elliptical and too condensed to be appreciated without some
introduction. The simplest way of drawing the learners in is to tell the piece as a story first. In
his/her introductory story, we can relate the content of the song or the rhyme using familiar
language and familiar experiences. The rhyme becomes a summary of a story that the learners
understand and enjoy.
The end of the lesson Are These Your Shoes? (Way Ahead 1, A Foundation Course in
English, Printha Ellis, Mary Bowen, 2007) may be a good moment for us to use a traditional British
song- Black Socks
Black socks, they never get dirty
The longer you wear them the stronger they get
Sometimes I think I should wash them,
But something inside me keeps saying
″Not yet, not yet, not yet, not yet, not yet, not yet!″
(British Children’s Songs, Action Songs and Nursery Rhymes, Jackie Reilly-1 Week course
for European Teachers of English at Primary Level, Shrewsbury, 2- 10 oct 2010)

e) The children can draw or paint their own pictures to illustrate the story and show what
they understood. They can try to tell the class what they have put in their pictures, compare the
pictures and notice the differences.

f) Another method to use these materials is to show the children pictures that illustrate the
content of a song or rhyme. Some of them are with gaps or mistakes. After listening, singing or
reciting the student should find the mistakes or complete the pictures. If that song or poem tells a
story, the illustrating pictures could be cut out and mixed. After they listened to the whole story,
they can put the pictures in the right order. It can be done at the blackboard or on a handout.

g) We can use them in order to train the listening skills. Before playing or singing a song,
we ask the pupils to listen for a certain word. When they hear it, they must raise their hands, they
can clap their hands, they can stand up or sit down. For example, when we discuss about antonyms
we can use The wise man and the foolish man song. Each time they hear these pairs of antonyms
wise- foolish, down- up, stand/ fall, firm- flat they have to perform something.
In order to raise the difficulty level of the exercise, the teacher can pronounce, in a
deliberately manner, some wrong words. The students have to correct these mistakes.

The wise man built his house upon a rock The foolish man built his house upon the sand
The wise man built his house upon a rock The foolish man built his house upon the sand
The wise man built his house upon a rock The foolish man built his house upon the sand
And the rain came tumbling down! And the rain came tumbling down!
 The rain came down and the foods came up The rain came down and the foods came up
The rain came down and the foods came up The rain came down and the foods came up
The rain came down and the foods came up The rain came down and the foods came up
And the house on the rock stood firm! And the house on the sand fell flat!
(British Children’s Songs, Action Songs and Nursery Rhymes, Jackie Reilly-1 Week course
for European Teachers of English at Primary Level, Shrewsbury, 2- 10 oct 2010)

Teaching English in primary school is always a difficult task. It takes a lot of time and effort
to prepare the lessons plans, to organise the learning activities, to select the appropriate materials.
It’s a great challenge to succed to keep pupils’ attention, to give them the opportunity to enjoy
themselves during these classes and to love English language. We can realise all these aims by
using in our lessons songs and rhymes.

Bibliography:

• British Children’s Songs, Action Songs and Nursery Rhymes, Jackie Reilly-1 Week course
for European Teachers of English at Primary Level, Shrewsbury, 2- 10 oct 2010
• Songs and Rhymes in Teaching English at Primary School- Simone Luck, Nicole
Sonnenberg, Volker Geyer, 2001
• Rhymes, Stories and Songs in the ESL Classroom-Joy L. M. Brown, jmbrown [at] una.edu
University of North Alabama (Florence, Alabama), The Internet TESL Journal
• Bugs 1-Elisenda Papiol, Maria Toth, Carol Read, Ana Soberon, , Macmillan, 2009
• Way Ahead 1, A Foundation Course in English- Printha Ellis, Mary Bowen, 2007