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Nursery Rhymes

Classroom Snapshots

Reading

The rhyme, rhythm and simplicity of nursery rhymes support students in successful reading of these texts. Nursery rhymes are short and memorable. Students see themselves as readers, and experience feelings of success. Recognition of words and phrases from nursery rhymes are readily transferred across to other classroom texts. Nursery rhymes are significant texts in the beginning reading program, supported by a range of levelled and unlevelled texts and rich children’s literature. In the Prep classes at Glenorchy Primary School, nursery rhymes provide the foundation for the reading program.

Independent reading of small cardboard nursery rhyme books.

Students can have their own teacher made copies of the rhyme that they can read over and over again.

These little books can be used as home readers.

Students have a special place to store their own teacher made books.

Reading to students

Reading the rhymes over and over again is important so that students can hear the language of the rhyme.

Shared reading

Enlarged copies of nursery rhymes are readily available or can easily be produced. This enables teachers to capitalise on the teaching strategy of shared reading where all students can see the text and join in the reading of the rhymes. The teacher may use shared reading sessions to explicitly teach reading strategies.

Shared reading can take different variations. Here a group of students read the rhyme together.

Text reconstruction

Text reconstruction is an effective teaching strategy that supports students to focus on the parts of language within the context of the whole text. Using large plastic pockets and commencing with the whole text displayed, shared reading of the text takes place.

The teacher models the process of text reconstruction involving students in a shared group situation.

Students reconstruct the text for themselves as a reading activity.

Text reconstruction.

These students
are reconstructing
the text using
rhyme cards.

There are many variations of text reconstruction. This activity involves students matching text at the sentence level to the original whole text. The sentences are glued on to the page covering the original text.

Baa Baa Black Sheep reconstruction activity. Students are required to cut out the sentences and place them in sequential order.

Sentence matching.

Jack and Jill

Word level reconstruction and matching.

This student is matching words to the original Little Miss Muffet text.

Working together and problem-solving collaboratively

Cloze activities support students to practise effective reading strategies.

Class murals provide opportunities for developing word knowledge. Here the students have jointly constructed a painted mural of Baa Baa Black Sheep and added labels using words from the rhyme.

Humpty Dumpty is sitting on a word wall with words from the nursery rhyme.

Who? What? Where?

Using a simple sentence from a text, students complete the chart by answering the questions who? what? and where? A picture can be placed in the centre of the ‘mat’.

A Cross-Curricular Perspective

Nursery rhymes lend themselves naturally to integration across the curriculum and engage students in related activities. Natural, unforced links are made as appropriate. Where relevant literacy is also linked to other learning areas. This provides opportunities to experience a range of genres such as procedural texts, recounts, reports and etc.

Little Miss Muffet

art and technology

Hickory Dickory Dock

An art and craft activity using milk cartons.

The completed item can be used for sentence and word matching. Students reconstruct cut up words and sentences matching them with the rhyme on the box.