Most people remember simple rhymes they learned during their childhood–rhymes such as “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” “ckory, Dickory Dock,” “Hey Diddle Diddle” and “Jack and Jill”–and many associate such rhymes with Mother Goose. Even though Mother Goose is often viewed as synonymous with nursery rhymes, poetry for children is not contained to Mother Goose rhymes–Mother Goose rhymes are poems, but all poems are not nursery rhymes. In fact, the name Mother Goose is not considered to be a particular person. Instead, Mother Goose is considered to be an imaginary author of a collection of fairy tales and nursery rhymes that were written during the 18th Century. According to Irene Colthurst in her article “What is the Difference Between Nursery Rhymes and Poems?”, “Nursery rhymes are a type of oral folklore that likely don’t have a single identifiable author. They just emerge in cultures as ways o
f soothing and entertaining children and passing on bits of cultural knowledge. Poems (on the other hand) are composed as a conscious act of literary art making, and can employ complex rhythms and rhymes; punctuation matters, being crucial to the meaning of poetry.” This activity will not only deepen your appreciation of nursery rhymes and poetry in children’s language development and socialization, it will also provide you with a glimpse into the rich literary history behind the genre. In this assignment, you will offer comments to your peers. Reading and reflecting on your peers’ ideas about style in poetry writing will help you enrich your knowledge of poetry writing for children. For this assignment, use the following guidelines as you write three well-developed paragraphs. This assignment is worth a total of 50 points. Your 3 paragraph writing is worth up 30 points and will be graded using the Your two peer responses are worth 10 points each.