Nursery rhyme videos - why we make them!

The first nursery rhyme from Little Baby Bum was Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. We chose this traditional children's song, as our first animation, due to the reason that there seemed to be no hints towards a dark origin, or sinister meanings behind the lyrics, making it as free of controversy as possible! However, it has to be said that, a lot of nursery rhymes, which are aimed primarily at preschool kids, do have more sinister undertones and histories. See this Rhymes website for more background information. Some of the very detailed information contained here is incredible! Whilst it's a fact that not everyone agrees on each rhyme's origins or meanings, which are indeed very much up for debate still, the speculation, reasoning and stories make for a great read.

To bring us more up to date with present day thinking: one thing that can be stated as a fact is that nursery rhymes are hugely beneficial learning aids for your child. According to the Wikipedia article on nursery rhymes: and specifically regarding the importance of nursery rhymes on young children's development:

“It has been argued that nursery rhymes set to music aid in a child's development. Research also supports the assertion that music and rhyme increase a child's ability in spatial reasoning, which leads to greater success in school in the subjects of mathematics and science” - indeed these quoted facts are backed up by third party/independent research.

Of course the main reason to show your children these wonderful and highly colourful songs and traditional poems is because they're such great fun! It's also great that there are videos of nursery rhymes on YouTube which offer parents a zero-cost way to access all their old favourites such as Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Baa Baa Black Sheep, Incy Wincy (or Itsy Bitsy) Spider, Hickory Dickory Dock and so on. Access to lots of free nursery rhymes is a brilliant way for parents to pass on their favourite songs from their own childhood to their baby and young children thereby keeping the old traditional songs alive. Having these songs made into videos propels them into the 21st century and keeps them very relevant. Let's not forget that it's so much fun for the adults to remember and choose all their favourite nursery rhymes for their own children and babies!

In a Guardian newspaper article from a few years ago, Booktrust asked 2500 people to vote for their favourite nursery rhyme and they then compiled a top 10. Do you agree or disagree? How about your children? Do they agree with this list?

At Little Baby Bum we pretty much agree with their top 10, although not necessarily the running order, and will be animating most of them.

Top 10 nursery rhyme songs:

1. Hickory Dickory Dock

2. Little Miss Muffet

3. Round and round the garden

4. Incy Wincy Spider (Itsy Bitsy in US)

5. Baa Baa Black Sheep

6. Jack and Jill

7. The grand old Duke of York

8. Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

9. Humpty Dumpty

10. If you're happy and you know it (clap your hands)

Our first video, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, is soon to be followed up by Baa Baa Black Sheep and Incy Wincy Spider, which all feature in the top 10 nursery rhymes. If you have any requests and your favourite nursery rhymes are not included in this list then please do let us know