Wednesday, 8th August 2007.

Lost For Words

I read recently that an increasingly large number of young children go to school with very little knowledge of nursery rhymes. It's largely because their parents choose not to sing to them, or don't know any in the first place. This is, of course, their choice but it struck a chord with me and I have to confess that over the last few weeks I've been doubling my efforts.

It started with simple recitation. From the day both our children were born I've sun them pop songs - Josh has always liked Aztec Camera's Somewhere In My Heart, while I Can See Clearly Now can send him to sleep when it's delivered at a slowish andante and sung in a hushed whisper. He even asked for The Boxer by name the last time we had to take him to A&E, although he calls it 'Lai La Lai'. But it occurred to me recently that he really needed something that he could sing back - something besides the theme to Teletubbies, which he's recently mastered, or the Radio 2 jingle that's become one of my favourite party pieces.

Josh, for his part, has responded admirably, even though he seems to be particularly obsessed with Old MacDonald - the song he'll request whenever I suggest we sing something. I wouldn't mind so much but my attempts to let him pick the animals have led to the strangest farm in the world - the Scottish cultivator has recently come into possession of a snake, a lion, a bus - oh, and a digger. And that's before we get to the Postman Pat references. Still, it adds some much needed variety to the ritual, which presently consists of three to four performances a day. When we can get him to sing something else, the melting pot of characters is something of a recurring theme: the other night we had five currant buns in a baker's shop that were purchased in turn by Mummy, Daddy, a hippo, a dolphin and a rowing boat.

For all that, I have to admit that Josh seems to be picking up words and memorising songs at breakneck speed - we now need only two or three run-throughs before he's mastered the simple words, and I regularly try leaving gaps in different places to see how much else he remembers. It's not a test - I don't care how quickly he grasps it and I try not to correct him, but it encourages him to sing and that can only be a good thing. I decided a long time ago that I wanted Josh, and his brother after him, to grow up in a house where music wasn't just something that lingered, but was something to be devoured, obsessed over, studied and appreciated.

Occasionally, however, it can backfire - as it did this evening in the shower. Having recently introduced him to the delights of Bagpuss - a programme that he seems to love, which is pleasing as we no longer need to cite regression therapy as a reason to watch it - we've also taken to playing the CD in the car whenever the opportunity presents himself. This is all well and good, but tonight Joshua revealed that he didn't know the words quite as well as I thought he did. Either that or he was horribly bored.

"I saw a ship come sailing, a-sailing on the - "
"Sea!"
"And oh but it was laden with pretty things for - "
"Me!"
So far so good. And I can live with his use of the first person - he's recently learned 'me' and 'my' and we're encouraging this as much as possible. It makes him sound less like Elmo.
"There were comforts in the cabin, and - "
"Nipples!"
"No, apples."
"Nipples! Nipples, Daddy!"
"APPLES! I swear, you've got a Freudian fixation."

I had to stop there; Emily's laughter was drowning us out.