Nursery Rhymes (Mother Goose)

I am the bounce on a knee and the clap of your hands. I am the happy song you sing about a little star that twinkles so bright. I am the rhyme about a little spider climbing up, up, up the water spout. I am the giggle you make before you go to sleep. Do you know who I am? I am a collection of your favorite songs and poems, and people call me Nursery Rhymes, or sometimes, Mother Goose.

For a very long, long time, I was just a whisper. I was a happy song passed from grandparents to parents and then to their children. No one wrote me down. Then, long ago in a place called England, around the year 1744, people decided to gather all my little rhymes together. A kind man who loved making books for children, named John Newbery, helped create a very special book. Around the year 1765, he made a book called 'Mother Goose's Melody.' He wanted to make sure all my silly friends, like Humpty Dumpty who sat on a wall and the cow that jumped right over the moon, would be remembered forever and ever.

Today, I am still alive every time you sing my songs. I live in your voice when you sing about the little sheep who has bags of wool. I am here to help you learn your ABCs and your 123s, but my most important job is to bring you smiles and fun. When you sing one of my rhymes, you are singing the same happy tune that children sang long, long ago. I am a song that connects you to them. I am a happy tune that never, ever ends because you keep singing and sharing me.