My mother used to sing a nursery rhyme to me and my little sister — back when she bounced us on her knee.
I went to the animal fair, the animals all were there; the big baboon by the light of the moon, was combing his auburn hair…
Her unique tweaking of the song's rhythm and pitch was tailor-made to build anticipation, and have us squealing with delight by the end of the tune.
The monkey he got drunk, and fell on the elephant's trunk; the elephant sneezed and went down on his knees; and that was the end of the monk... the monk... the monk... [repeated endlessly until finally...] ... keeeeeeeeee!
We never did know when that last powerful syllable would arrive, and at the same time we'd be tossed up into the air and onto the bed.
Loading...It's a scene repeated in homes around Australia, so it's no surprise that RN's All in the Mind was inundated when it recently invited people to send in recordings of songs they sang to their kids.
We received a barrage of "silly, sweet, spontaneous" tunes, complete with a fair bit of originality.
But why do children turn us into non-stop singing machines?
Getting your baby's attention
When our children are very young, they are absorbing so many new things, says Alix Woolard from the Telethon Kids Institute.
And this is likely one of the reasons why singing to children is so important: it sticks out against the relative humdrum sound of adults talking to each other.
"It's a really great tool for grabbing a baby's attention," Dr Woolard, an expert in "baby talk" told All in the Mind's Sana Qadar.
She says research has shown that brain activity changes in babies when we sing to them.
"There are a bunch of studies that show that babies have a preference for this type of communication."
Kellie Scott often finds herself unconsciously making up little ditties like this diggy do dah song:
Loading...Teaching baby how to interact
Once you have your child's attention, songs can also help teach them the skills of interacting with other people.
Just like a break in a sentence can signal it's someone else's turn to talk, a break in a song can invite a child to respond with a smile, giggle, babble or — if they're old enough — a missing word.
So even before they can talk properly, they can learn the social art of taking turns.
"It's teaching kids how to be around and communicate with other people," Dr Woolard says.
Mike Williams made up a tune especially for when it was time to check his daughter Daphne's nappy.
Loading...Now listen to Mike singing the song while actually checking Daphne's nappy, and listen to her response:
Loading..."He is allowing the baby to learn how to turn-take, but also to learn language. How cool is that?" Dr Woolard says.
It has to be said that nappy-changing was a popular subject for the songs sent in to All in the Mind.
Natalia Henderson-Faranda puts a French twist on her version:
Loading...And Matt Burrell rocks out the lyrics to his nappy song in his "80s power ballad":
Loading...From soothing lullabies to stretching vowels
The songs we make up for our kids change as they grow.
Particularly in the first six weeks, the songs tend to be soothing — think of lullabies as you rock your child in your arms and share a lovely moment of bonding.
Given the emotional time that can accompany having a newborn, singing like this can also be soothing to the parent at the same time.
Perth mum Yvonne Ardley sings this lullaby to her son Rowan:
Loading...Once babies start to roll over, look around at the world, pick things up and play with them we tend to alter the pitch of our songs a bit more.
We slide the pitch up and down, stretch our vowels and repeat words to help build language skills.
Geelong mum Georgia Jarecki-Warke's song illustrates how her baby responds when she hyper-articulates her vowels in this sing-song number:
Loading...Then as the baby hits the nine-month mark, they start to attempt to say words.
""This is when you start to repeat words," Dr Woolard says.
"It's less about the pitch you are using, and more about the content."
Making everyday chores fun
Once our kids hit two or three it's about making everyday chores a fun, shared experience.
Take Joji Malani, who made up this song for his two-year-old daughter Kiki when he was having to contort her body in uncomfortable ways to get her dressed.
He says it was about making an otherwise "tortuous situation" for Kiki an "event" she looked forward to.
Joji couldn't help doing a remix of a song by the band Third Eye Blind called "Semi-Charmed Life" to help get his little girl Frankie ("Kiki") dressed.
Loading...Meanwhile Georgia Garside made up a song to reassure her older children while she was feeding the youngest one, that she'd be giving them some attention soon:
Loading...When the 'cringe factor' sets in
Sadly, around about the time they start school, kids can start cringing at your songs, rather than enjoying them.
Ryan Egan recalls a song he used to sing to get his two boys into the bathroom to clean their teeth:
Loading...But, he says, all this stopped when the children were old enough to brush their own teeth. These days Ryan's six and eight-year-old tell him to be quiet when he sings in the car.
Dr Woolard says children's loss of interest in song could be partly due to the fact that it has served its purpose: at this stage you can actually just have conversations with them instead, she says.
But we can only hope that the love of singing returns when they're older.
In my case it certainly did.
Listen to 'Why do we sing to babies?' to hear more songs, and subscribe to RN All in the Mind to explore other topics on the mind, brain and behaviour.
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2023-08-26 21:00:00Z
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