I am warming up to writing one post a day about what I have learned from my children. For the warm-up, I have been considering as another memory, how grateful I am to have learned so many of my cultural nursery rhymes, children’s songs and children’s games.
The how and why of memorizing poems came into my life this way. In about 1950, the Grade III teacher told my father that my brother one year younger than me was not doing well in school. He would probably not make it past Grade VI she said. Doral wasn’t happy with that speculation.
Earl couldn’t seem to remember many facts in her mind, so off he went to elocution lessons. The object? To learn a poem a week. So as not to target Earl as needing help, Doral arranged that I went along as well – just two siblings off at lessons. So for my part, it seemed like a normal childhood, learning bits of cultural capital. Lesson time.
I carried this practise of learning stories and poems into my own parenting. Singing songs and reciting nursery rhymes was just what children did.
I must be carrying the practice into my grandmothering, for I noticed today that when my Betty came over to play, I pulled out a nursery rhyme book and we interspersed learning poems with Lego play and putting clothes on LOL dolls.
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| My little old man and I fell out I'll tell you what twas all about: I had money and he had none, And that's the way the row begun. |
These are not poems of my choosing.
She is working her way through the book and telling me which pages I should teach her next, and on the way to those pages, she recites or sings the pages she knows for me.
If there is any problem here it is that I should have chosen a better nursery rhyme book. I was too cheap to get a brand new one, since I always seem to need one at my house, at their house, or at the cabin, – so I grabbed this one from the Churches of Salmon Arm Thrift store. The book is dated 1974 and I might paid $2 for it. Just the right price for me. But a little low in visual value. In a book which I can no longer find, all of the songs are illustrated with a picture from the National Gallery. Not this one, printed with one colour per page. Boring. And old stories. I just have to imagine that I am doing upscale vintage rhymes with her.
To back up a bit, having spent so many years doing fairy tales and nursery rhymes with the older children, I knew that I could not go through that again with Richard (born 16 years later than some of them) without dying intellectually. So I started looking for the less known rhymes just to keep my interest up. I found them. Richard got to learn “Tell-tale tit / your tongue shall be split / and all the little puppy dogs / will have a piece of it”. I must have been looking for some way to control him in ways that I had missed with the other kids.
All of that aside, I do value rich memories of teaching nursery rhymes and playing games with children.
Election lessons?? Ria
ReplyDeleteThanks Ria. I will correct that to elocution lessons.
ReplyDeleteIn honour of your post, at our dinner table we each recited a song or rhyme. None of ours ended up being in English tonight. Perhaps tomorrow.
ReplyDeleteDavid recited the first verse of Lewis Carroll's poem "The Jabberwocky." He learned it this year in his Drama class. It was fun to follow along, seeing if my memory matched his words and pronuncitation. As you may recall, it goes like this:
’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
Joaquim recited a Catalan finger play. I asked him who taught it to him. He replied, "You're kidding me. You expect I can recall that? ... Well, it must have been my mom." It is sometimes a mystery how we know these rhymes, and we don't even know we know them, until someone starts saying it. Here's Joaquim's:
Ralet, ralet,
pica dineret!
Ral is the name of a coin, a coin that was not current by the time he was learning the song (like a Canadian penny now is, I suppose). Ralet is the diminuative version of ral (like doggie is to dog). Diner (pronounced dee-neigh) means money, not a specific coin, but rather money in general. Dineret (deen-er-ette) means a small amount of money or a one little coin. Pica (peek-a) means "hit/tap/sting."
The adult draws three circles playfully in the child's palm with a light tickling touch, one for each of the first three word (ralet, ralet, ralet). Then, as they recite the last two words (pica dineret), they give the child's palm an affectionate pat.
I recognized the words because Joaquim used to recite this to David when he was little, mostly back in Florida, I think.
I sang a children's song in Secwepemctsin that I learned today. I was giving a guest lecture in an Early Childhood Eduction class today at the Salmon Arm campus of the Okanagan College. The students wanted useful activities or strategies they could apply in daycare or preschool with children ages 3-5. We took existing activities they already enjoy doing, and added extension ideas. We covered three activities: washing hands, listening to a Secwepemc story (of why Raven's eat rocks), and a song. The song went like this:
Weyt-k, le7en k tucw
Weyt-k, le7en k tucw
Weyt-k, le7en k tucw
How are you?
It was sung to a tune I know for "Hello, friends. Hellow friends. Hello, friends. I'm glad you came to play." This version translates to "Hello, how are you?" three times in Secwepemctsin and the fourth line in English. It is sung to the beat of a drum in one class at the start of circle time. Our extension was to try a walking version, or a version where you get to go up and greet others during the song. The teacher had us greet the COVID19 way (elbow bumps or wave). That was fabulous. We also discussed whether it would be okay to teach children to do a head nod instead of a wave. We decided, teach them lots of ways to greet others, especially if it is fun.
I liked thinking tonight about poems/songs, language, and culture. Thank you, mom.
Two for one posts on this, with both Arta's post and Bonnies comment! awesome!
ReplyDeleteI agree with Rebecca that this was a two for one post. I try to make it three-or-one:
ReplyDeleteBonnie, Joaquim and David? Thank you for carrying over the Nursery Rhyme post into your dinner time conversation. How funny that you all chose pieces to do from different languages.
David? You are the only other person I know who can do the Jabberwocky poem except for your Uncle Doral Johnson. I can do the first two lines, but I miss a word on the third line and I don’t get the prosody right on the fourth line. Joaquim? I tried your Catalan poem on the palm of my own hand, imagining how I would do it on the palm of a child. That was fun. And as I was doing it I was thinking about my three week trip to Catalonia with you and Bonnie and how much I enjoyed immersing myself in the culture there, though I didn’t learn any language.
Bonnie? By telling me that you were learning a welcoming song in Secwepemctsin and alluding to a story, you sent me off in my own direction. That is, I am going to use Google and see if I can find the story of Why Raven Eats Rocks. I have that task written here in my notebook on my To Do list.
Thanks for the report on the conversation at dinnertime.