Nursery rhymes:

 Finger family

# Age #:

The activity is for kids with 3- 4 years old.

# Aims #:

o   To work finger psychomotricity

o   To learn the family members

o   To represent the family members (symbolic image)

o   To learn the work in groups

# When #:

We are going to sing the song after the circle time, in the second term, because at that moment they already know each other.

# Where #:

We sing this song in the classroom.

# Time #:

To sing this song and then to do the activity we need about 15 minutes.

# Resources- Materials #

o   Shapes of the hand of the kids, the shape of the tree.

o   The photos of the family kids.

o   Puppet.

o   Paint and glue.

o   Finger family puppets.

# Activity #:

First we introduce the puppet and we sing him the song “Hello”, then the puppet sing us a song about family finger and then the kids have to paint the shapes of their hands with the members of their family. After that, they have to put what they drew near the photo of their family.

Origin of the nursery rhymes

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. Most nursery rhymes were not written down until the 18^th century, when the publishing of children’s books began to move from polemic and education towards entertainment, but there is evidence for many rhymes existing before this, including” To market, to market” and  “ Cook a doodle doo”, which date from at least the late 16^th century.

All that nursery rhymes seems to have come from a variety of sources, including traditional riddles, proverbs, ballads, lines of Mummer’s plays, drinking songs, historical events, and, it has been suggested, ancient pagan rituals. About half of the currently recognized “traditional” English rhymes were known by middle 18^th century.

This popular nursery rhyme is a translation of the French classic Frère Jacques. Actually, Frere Jacques is translated into almost every language in the world. This makes the rhyme one of the most used rhymes worldwide.

The finger family comes from the “Tommy thumb’s pretty song book”, who is the earliest extant printed collection of English language nursery rhymes, published in London in 1744, by Mary Cooper. It was a sequel to the lost “Tommy thumb’s song book” and contains the oldest version of many well-known and popular rhymes as well as several that have been largely forgotten.

The song:

Daddy finger, daddy finger, were are you?

Here I am, here I am. How do you do?

Mommy finger, mommy finger, were are you?

Here I am, here I am. How do you do?

Brother finger, Brother finger, were are you?

Here I am, here I am. How do you do?

Sister finger, Sister finger, were are you?

Here I am, here I am. How do you do?

Baby finger, Baby finger, were are you?

Here I am, here I am. How do you do?