Jack Be Nimble: 3 More Ways to Play

Jack Be Nimble,

Jack Be Quick,

Jack Jump Over the Candlestick! 

Jack jumped high,

Jack jumped low,

Jack jumped over and burned his toe!

Who is Jack?

Like so many traditional rhymes, we can't be 100% certain of the origin of this chant recorded in 1815.  Here are three possibilities: First, Yellow Fever, also known as Yellow Jack, is a viral disease that sometimes leads to jaundice. In a time when treatments had more to do with superstition than science, it was thought that lighting a fire in the room of the infirm would draw the fever out. Perhaps this rhyme is an invocation for the fever to 'jump' into the fire.

Second, 'Calico' Jack Rackham (1620-1720) was a pirate captain, captured and hanged in a cage as a warning to others. The rhyme could be a celebration of Jack's many near misses before he was finally caught.

Third, is a theory that the poem relates to a tradition of using candles to divine the future. Candle-jumping was popular in Buckinghamshire, England in the 1600's, where a St Catherine's Day festival would end with leaping over a candle.  It was thought that jumping over the lit candle without extinguishing the flame would bring good luck. 

YOU Jump Over a Candlestick! 

Even if we're not sure who the original 'Jack' was, we have lots of fun with this rhyme in class inserting your child's name into the chant as he jumps over a candle. There is no shortage to the benefits of reciting chants like this one for both literacy and music skills.  Kids who can recite a chant:

• Have increased self-confidence
• Have more awareness of how words and grammar work
• Have a more extensive vocabulary (words like 'nimble'!)
• Have clear and modulated speech
• Are better able to make up their own rhymes and recognize spelling patterns
• Have improved ability to memorize
• Can create a steady beat and flow words over it
• Can find meter in poetry and perform it correctly

Want a fancy new candle to jump over? It's easy to make a pretty great one from a cardboard roll. 

1. Let your child decorate the roll.  
2. Draw a flame shape on orange paper and have your child cut it out.  
3. Cut two small slits in the bottom of the flame so it will sit on the tube. 
4. Set it on the floor and... JUMP OVER! Easy!


3 More Ways to Play

Game 1: Names: Of course your little guy can have a ton of fun inserting family names into the chant to coerce all of his family members (and favorite stuffed animals and action figures) to do the jumping. Nothing motivates him to practice a poem more than knowing that at any time, in any place (the grocery store? the library?) your toddler could launch into "MOM be nimble!" and of course, Mom will start hopping around like a goof, and you'll both burst into giggles.

Game 2: Rhymes: Recognizing how to make rhymes is a powerful literacy skill that doesn't have to be boring to practice. Change up the words of the poem to create rhymes for other items around your house (or use pictures of items.) Challenge your child to guess how each verse is going to end. Some of these objects can be jumped over; others might be climbed over. Of course your child will like it if you lift him up and swoop him over the big ones.

How does this rhyme end?

Jack be nimble, if you're able,

Jack jump over the kitchen _____.

Jack be nimble, do it again,

Jack jump over my blue ink _____.

Jack be nimble, read the news,

Jack jump over Mommy's ______.

Jack be nimble, Jack jump up,

Jack jump over my water ______.

Jack be nimble, Jack be fair,

Jack jump over my Teddy ______.

Jack be nimble, Jack come look,

Jack jump over my favorite ______. 

Game 3: Movement: Of course I LOVE that this chant gets us up and moving. Young children learn best when they have a whole-body experience, and they need plenty of practice to master the coordination of muscles.  

In this version of the game, invent different ways for your child to move by replacing the word JUMP with: SWIM, STEP, TWIRL, ROLL, CRAWL, SQUAT, TIP-TOE, FLY, TRIP, SCOOT, etc. If some of these aren't safe to do over a candlestick, try going around. 'Danny scoot around the candlestick.'

-Gina Weibel, M.S.

Let's Play Music Teacher

A Happy Ending for the Three Blind Mice. Why folk music?

You child might be asking you: Why were the mice blind? Why did the farmer's wife chase them!?  What happened next!?

Rest easy once you've heard the extended story with pictures and happy ending, in this online (and offline) storybook by John Ivimey. The mice even end up with a pet cockroach…so friendly!

CLICK HERE TO READ THE BOOK

History of Three Blind Mice

This nursery rhyme became mainstream in children's literature in the 1842 publishing of "The Nursery Rhymes of England". However, it was originally written with music in 1609.  It is speculated that the origin of the tale of the mice came from the Catholic Queen Mary I (Bloody Mary), Henry VIII's only surviving daughter, who was known for her merciless hounding of Protestants.  The story could relate to Mary's 1555 execution by burning of three Protestant bishops.  The mice's blindness could be interpreted as faithlessness, alluding to their rejection of Catholicism.

Mary Tudor is also featured in the nursery rhyme "Mary Mary, quite Contrary", enjoyed by our Sound Beginnings Students.  The 'silver bells' and 'cockle shells' in the garden likely referenced torture devices like thumbscrews, and the 'maids' referred to The Maid (a pre-guillotine device for beheading).

Why Do We Sing Nursery Rhymes?

Let's Play Music adopts many Kodaly concepts of music education.  Authentic folk music has short form, pentatonic style, and simple, repetetive language.  The clear, simple, musical styles in nursery rhymes provide the perfect foundation for mastering beginning rhythmic and melodic skills.  Mastery of skills and concepts in progressive levels of difficulty is critical for the long-term musical success desired by Let's Play Music families.  'Three Blind Mice' is a melody that has withstood the test of time; any tune with poor melodic or rhythmic qualities would not have been passed from generation to generation for over 400 years!

"Kodaly felt that simple, expressive forms of nursery songs and folk music were most suitable for children because they were living music, not fabricated or contrived for pedagogical purposes. The language of folk music tends to be simple, drawn from speech patterns familiar to children even before they enter school."

"Kodaly felt a close relationship between the music of the people and the music of great composers. He believed that a love for the masterworks could be cultivated through a knowledge of and a love for one's own folk music."

Folk music plays an important artistic role for each musician: providing a cultural musical background.  In the Let's Play Music effort to educate the whole musician, we practice singing several folk songs to provide students with an ageless cultural background from which to draw from as they begin creating their own music.  

A fantastic way to understand the simplicity and richness of folk music is to peek at samples of folk music from several different cultures (click here).  You'll notice that each cultural video shows simple music, with only a few musicians, using instruments characteristic of their country.  Folk music often takes place outside for anyone to dance to.  Now that you've joined Let's Play Music, you'll have many opportunities to play and dance to folk music, too.

Let's Play Music also adheres to the 9 National Standards for Music Education.  Standard number 9 is: understand music in relation to history and culture. We offer a valuable string to the past when we teach children that music has been around since before even their parents were born!  Music has a role in life beyond just entertainment, and even beyond music education.  Your music teacher might let your child in on the secret that today they learned a song that is over 400 years old!  Back in that century, singing rhymes and songs to each other was the way people recorded history.  

A Little More Mi-Re-Do

Of course we love the simple melodies in folk songs since they give our beginning students the perfect complexity of tune to examine and identify.  Your child should be able to  hear and identify the mi-re-do in 'Three Blind Mice' and soon will be able to figure out how to pick out the entire tune, note-by-note on bells or keyboard from carefully listening and identifying solfeg. Encourage your child to 'mess around' with the bells, tell him that he just might able to figure out a well-known song, and chances are he'll come to you with a big proud smile once he gets it!

'Hot Cross Buns' is another easy mi-re-do tune you may want to sing and play with your child this week.  It actually ONLY uses these 3 notes!  (MRD, MRD, DDDD, RRRR, MRD).  If you let your child in on the 3-bell secret, and challenge him to pick out the melody, he'll master it like a jigsaw puzzle.  

Like any puzzle, we start with the easy puzzles that only have a few pieces.  Eventually your child's ears will be ready for more complex puzzles.  The ability to sing melodies from memory and pick them out on a keyboard is an exercise in relative pitch / intervallic ear training, some of the basic skills that Let's Play Music incorporates in our training of the whole musician.

-Gina Weibel, M.S.

Related Articles:

- Musical Superpower: Develop Perfect Pitch

- Ear Training: Learn to hear Intervals