Young children acquire language through responsive connections with adults.  Positive reinforcement encourages them to communicate more.  Simple fingerplays are a great way to enhance learning and understanding.  When children actively participate through the words and actions of fingerplays, it is a natural extension of early language development.  Fingerplays are not only lots of fun, but are also a powerful rhyming skill.

Infants:

On Your Head

On your head my hands I place.

On your shoulders, on your face.

To your lips, by your side.

Quickly behind your back they hide.

Stretch Your Hands

Stretch your hands.

Give a little clap.

Touch your shoulders.

Lay them in your lap.

Have the infant sitting in your lap and follow the directions of the fingerplays while holding their hands.

Toddlers:

Up, Up

Here we go up, up, up.

Here we go down, down, down.

Here we go backwards and forward,

And around and around.

Show Me A Rabbit

Show me a rabbit that is fat, fat, fat.

With two paws that go pat, pat, pat.

With two ears that go flop, flop, flop.

And two feed that go hop, hop, hop.

Toddlers love to move and these two fingerplays are perfect activities to keep them moving.

Preschoolers:

Pitter Patter

Oh where do you come from,

You little drops of rain?

Pitter patter, pitter patter,

Down the window pane.

Tell me little raindrops,

Is that the way you play?

Pitter patter, pitter patter,

All the rainy day.

Clap, Clap, Clap Your Hands

Clap, clap, clap your hands

Clap your hands together.

Clap, clap, clap your hands

Clap your hands together.

(Stamp, stamp, stamp your feet.)

(Jump, jump, jump around.)

(Hop, hop up and down.)

(Turn, turn, turn around.)

Preschoolers are ready for longer fingerplays and like to make up their own actions.  Encourage them to create their own.

Ellen Booth Church, author of The Great Book of Classroom Songs, Rhymes and Cheers suggests that fingerplays, poetry, and nursery rhymes are an excellent way to introduce vocabulary, because they are often predictable and brief.  She says they should be repeated often so that young children can remember them.

What the child imitates, he begins to understand.                            (Frederick Froebel)