However I think I am getting too old to sit on the floor, pretending to row row row!

Row row row your boat words

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
Life is but a dream.

It has been suggested that the words refer to the difficulties of life.  The rowing boat refers to the person travelling in a set direction. Merrily merrily refering to facing life with cheer. Then the conclusion being life is anything but a dream. Like many nursery rhymes – it is not a happy tale!

Row row row your boat is usually sung ‘in the round’. This is where each person or group of people sing the same words and melody, but start at different times.

I especially like the alternative verses of this rhyme that I’ve heard – there are many but these are my favourite ones:

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the river.
If you see a polar bear;
Don’t forget to shiver.

and

Row, row, row your boat,
Row another mile.
If you see a crocodile;
Don’t forget to smile.

Finally here is a version of the song, sung complete with lyrics!

Great value Nursery Rhmes DVD’s for your child.

Sit with her and look through old magazines for numbers. Ask her to point out numbers when she sees them, the bigger the number the better (I don’t mean high numbers, but numbers that take up a lot of room!)

When you find a number, get her to cut it out carefully with child’s scissors.

When you have a pile of numbers, arrange them on a piece of paper and glue them down.

Count the numbers, see which ones you have missing. Which numbers are which? Talk about which numbers you can see.

More number fun

You can download these numbers here. Please print them out.

Your child can colour them in, cut them out or practice their numbers with them.

You can download this clown here Please print him out.

Your child can colour him in, count the balls, write numbers in the balls, or colour them in.

Humpty Dumpty – the words

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall
All the kings horses
And all the kings men
Couldn’t put Humpty together again!

Humpty Dumpty is one of the 1st nursery rhymes that I remember singing over and over again as a child.

Humpty Dumpty is usually portrayed as an egg and has appeared many times in literature all over the world. The origin of “Humpty Dumpty” possibly refers to a clumsy person.

Here is the rhyme:

On another note….

The Humpty Dumpty Safety Helmet – Don’t sit on a wall without it!

This clip from Seseme Street made me laugh so much. It is true – eggs should really not sit on walls without safety helmets!

Great value Nursery Rhmes DVD’s for your child.

Fast forward the following video to 5 mins 43 secs. Michael McIntyre sums it up so well. It’s so true and so funny. The clip is from Live at the Apollo.

Going to playschool for the first time, I did feel like that. It almost felt like my son was communicating very little – but the little girls were sat in the corner doing the Times crossword (and the cryptic one at that). OK, so every child is different. Some grow up faster than others regardless of whether they are a boy or girl. So many things influence their development. It just seems to be the boys following the girls in developing language, and communicating what they want.

Maybe as a mother, you just notice the differences in children. Some kids are more advanced, and that worries you. Some kids are less able, that makes you feel all superior. But all kids are good at some things and worse at others. I really don’t see that there is right and wrong.

Going to playgroup, preschool and then nursery certainly improved my son’s language skills. He quickly progressed from a few words and many tears, to communicating sentences, role playing and becoming an amazingly funny little boy.

It still leaves me with questions though…

Do you have boy/girl twins?

Do you have boys and girls?

Have you noticed a difference between their rates of development?

It is probably impossible for children today to imagine only 3 TV channels and no kids TV on a Sunday. Black Beauty was the best Sunday TV had to offer in my day.

Before my baby was born, I was looking forward to the joys of CBeebies. I think I may have been crazy. Yes some of the programmes are brilliant, but when you have seen the same one 3 times in one day, you start to go slightly bonkers. I will admit some programmes I could watch endlessly. Timmy Time and Pingu are my favourites. Luckily for me, they are favourites of 3yo too! It is slightly disturbing though that he has a fondness for Waybuloo. Just what is that show about? I just don’t get it. Maybe you have to be under 5 to appreciate these things. I hate the dubbed voices, I hate the freaky floating creatures. I hate the fact that pretty much nothing happens.

I like kids TV programmes to be fun, bright and educational. Justin Fletcher seems to get it right. Mr Tumble is genius, Gigglebiz IS funny, Something Special teaches us sign language in a way that I and 3yo actually remember. I love the shows that give me ideas for what I can do with 3yo. I Can Cook – Katy cooks things that are healthy and fun to make. Kids cooking doesn’t have to be just Crispie Crackles. Mister Maker and Doodle Do have fun arts and crafts ideas that keep me and 3yo entertained. (Maybe they just keep the inner Blue Peter presenter in me satisfied.)

It is easy to let CBeebies become your babysitter though. The off button on the TV is hard to press, even when you are going nuts at the thought of watching Balamory AGAIN! Some experts say that you shouldn’t let your young child watch TV. Some say limit it. I agree that if your child is doing something else, don’t have it on in the background. It is a distraction that doesn’t help young minds concentrate on something else, and let’s face it, it can send mum potty! The CBeebies babysitter is useful when you are busy. It has it’s drawbacks though. The songs and theme tunes wafting in from the living room to the kitchen while you are making dinner, can have the effect of getting inside your head for hours. Anyone been humming the tune to Timmy Time – ALL THE TIME?

What do you think is the best and worst of kids TV?

This list below was sent to me by my health visitor. My son can do much better than some of them, and struggles with others. It is a good quideline though…  

Stages of Development of a 3 year old

Posture and large movements

• Can walk up and down the stairs, jumps from bottom step
• Climbs easily
• Turns round obstacles and corners while running
• Walks forwards, backwards and sideways
• Rides a tricycle using the pedals
• Can stand and walk on tiptoe
• Can throw a ball overhand, catches a large ball on or between extended arms
• Kicks a ball

Vision and Fine Movements

• Builds a tower of 9-10 bricks high
• Threads large wooden beads onto shoelaces
• Holds a pencil in preferred hand, copies a circle and a cross.
• Can draw a man with a head and one or two features
• Names and matches 2 or 3 primary colours
• Cuts with children’s scissors

Hearing and Speech

• Gives full name, sex and sometimes age
• Carries on simple conversation,
• Able to briefly describe present and past experiences
• Asks questions – Who?, Where? What?
• Listens eagerly to stories and demands favourites
• Knows several nursery rhymes to repeat and sometimes sing
• Counts up to 10 or more

Social behaviour and Play

• Eats with a fork or spoon
• Washes hands but needs adult supervision in drying
• Can pull pants and knickers up and down, but needs help with buttons and other fastenings
• Toilet trained through the day, sometimes has accidents
• Likes to help adults with domestic activities
• Enjoys floor play, with bricks, boxes, toy trains, dolls, prams
• Make believes alone or with other children
• Understands sharing
• Shows affection for younger siblings
• Shows some understanding between past present and future, ie yesterday, today and tomorrow

Great value books on toddler and infant development

This is a really quick and easy craft idea. 3yo loves making this crown. It is really versatile as it can be made for a special occasion like Christmas, or just for fun with any odd bits of paper or card. Cutting out pictures from magazines looks good. As does painting the crown all different colours.

Here is a step by step guide to making the paper plate crown – which we made here as a festive Christmas Crown.   You will need:

1. Paper plate
2. Scissors

Then for decoration, either paint, or coloured paper/card and glue.

Glitter, tinsel, feathers, or leaves, could be used as well.

First start off by making your crown…

Now you are ready to start decorating!

1. Take a normal paper plate
2. Fold it in half
3. Cut from the middle of the folded part towards the edge, like pizza pieces.
4. Fold the pieces back to make a crown
5. Try it on for size!
6. Start sticking coloured paper, leaves, glitter, anything – onto the triangles
7. Add as much or a little onto your crown
8. You should now have a colourful crown

All it needs…  is little more bling – as it is Christmas we added some tinsel.

I am already imagining everyone sitting down to Christmas dinner, wearing these hats!  I like making this crown, as the variations are almost endless. Toddlers love making things and they can do almost all of this themselves. Cutting the paper plate with scissors, is the only bit I take total control of!

Great crafty idea from Ang at www.amumssurvivalguide.co.uk Thanks Ang!

If you enjoy art and craft ideas for kids try:

This is so true – kids love sweet things. Why not, I love chocolate, but I don’t remember getting much chocolate or sweets as a child. Fridays were chocolate day. My Dad would bring home chocolate which we would all munch though after tea. Now the tables are turned. 3yo loves sweets, candy, chocolate, cake – you name it. Yes, we give him SOME, but when should a child 1st get candy?

Setting your children up with a sweet tooth too young?

One argument goes that giving your children sweets at a very young age will teach them that sweet things are good, and encourage them to reach for a chocolate bar instead of fruit when they are older and fancy a snack. The levels of obesity in children and young people surely bares out this theory.

Children need nutrious food, not empty calories

Children grow phyisically and mentally so quickly when they are young. It makes sense to give them food that will nourish their minds and bodies the most.

When is too young?

Having said that, it is easy to say, “I’m never going to give my toddler candy.” In practice, it is so much harder. They get chocolate selection boxes for Christmas, their friends eat sweets, they LIKE sweets. I guess my reaction is, in moderation it’s OK.

It also makes sense to never give a baby sweets. They really don’t need it and they could easily choke on something that isn’t totally soft. A small piece of chocolate that melts in their mouth is probably the best of the bunch.

Our 3yo really only gets chocolate even now. I worry about the effect sugary sweets will have on his teeth. I would prefer him to want grapes and raisins for a snack – and the majority of the time he does. Sometimes though, he just wants CHOCOLATE. Is it genetic? Sometimes it is just very hard to say no.

How old were your children when you 1st gave them sweets? Are you suceeding at holding off? Or do you just let them have what they want?

This is a rhyme I can never remember all the words to. My version always seems to get mixed up somewhere in the middle. 3yo doesn’t seem to notice – yet!  

Oranges and Lemons words

“Oranges and lemons”, says the bell of St. Clement’s
“You owe me five farthings”, says the bell of St. Martin’s
“When will you pay me?” says the bell of Old Bailey
“When I grow rich”, says the bell of Shoreditch
“When will that be?” says the bell of Stepney
“I do not know,” says the great bell of Bow
Here comes a candle to light you to bed
And here comes a chopper to chop off your head!

When I was little, I remember  this was an exciting song at birthday parties due to the game that went along with it. You just didn’t want to be the ‘last man’.

The game goes like this:

Players file, in pairs, through an arch made by two of the players (made by having the players face each other, raise their arms over their head, and clasp their partners’ hands). The challenge comes during the final lines:

Here comes a candle to light you to bed.
Here comes a chopper to chop off your head.
(Chip chop, chip chop, the last man’s dead.)

On the last word, the children forming the arch drop their arms to catch the pair of children currently passing through, who are then “out” and must form another arch next to the existing one. In this way, the series of arches becomes a steadily lengthening tunnel through which each set of two players have to run faster and faster to escape in time.

Alternate versions of the game include: children caught “out” by the last rhyme may stand behind one of the children forming the original arch, instead of forming additional arches; and, children forming “arches” may bring their hands down for each word of the last line, while the children passing through the arches run as fast as they can to avoid being caught on the last word.*

Oranges and lemons – the song!

*www.wikipedia.org

Great value Nursery Rhmes DVD’s for your child.

It was the first song that my child started to sing. Well I say started, because all he managed was EE II EE II OOOH. He loved it, and loved all the different animal noises.

At nursery, the leader asked for the children to shout out the next animal. She got very stuck when aliens, and dinosaurs were called for!    

There seem to be several ways of singing this rhyme, the simpler (much easier way) is one animal for each verse. The version I like is as follows, by the end ALL the animals have a turn in the last verse!

Old MacDonald had a farm – the words

Old Macdonald had a farm
Ee-eye, ee-eye, oh
And on that farm he had a duck
Ee-eye, ee-eye, oh
With a quack, quack here
And a quack, quack there
Here a quack, there a quack
Everywhere a quack, quack
Old Macdonald had a farm
Ee-eye, ee-eye, oh

Old Macdonald had a farm
Ee-eye, ee-eye, oh
And on that farm he had a cow
Ee-eye, ee-eye oh
With a moo, moo here
And a moo, moo there
Here a moo, there a moo
Everywhere a moo, moo
Quack, quack here
And a quack quack there
Here a quack, there a quack
Everywhere a quack, quack
Old Macdonald had a farm
Ee-eye, ee-eye, oh

Old Macdonald had a farm
Ee-eye, ee-eye, oh
And on that farm he had a … (add an animal at each verse)

Old MacDonald had a farm – the song

Great value Nursery Rhmes DVD’s for your child.