Hey Diddle Diddle & Other Mother Goose Rhymes (2024)

Ages 4-10 I have a hard time keeping mother goose rhymes in my library. Every year I introduce a new book, it gets checked out and lost. It's rather surprising really as the language is becoming more archaic with time. Tomie DePaola's humerous pictures help to carry the text in Hey Diddle Diddle. More recent books creating an entire book from a single nursery rhyme such as "The comic adventures of Old Mother Hubbard and her Dog" by Tomi DePaola and the newest versions of "The house that Jack Built" may give the reader better tools by which to remember the rhymes but this particular volume is a very nice little collection.

Given the fact this book won the Notable/Best Books (A.L.A.) and was also reviewed by Publishers Weekly, Booklist,the New York Times and Horn Book I expected to find recommendations but the reviews must be in the archives because I was unable to find more than a reference to their existence.

Grades: toddlers to kindergarten

summary: The classic mother goose nursery rhyme illustrated by Tomie dePaola in his book Mother Goose Nursery rhymes. The nursery rhyme is funny, playful, and silly so students have fun manipulating and learning new sounds. Because have you ever seen a cow jump over the moon? Or have you seen a dish run away with a spoon?

Review: Students will laugh out loud as you read Hey diddle Diddle with the support of Tomie dePaola and his illustrations students will make the connection of art to words.

Uses: manipulation of speech sounds, phonemic awareness

Today’s Poetry Tea Time selection. DePaola’s illustration style is not my favorite, which lessened my own enjoyment of this book. The rhymes were mostly familiar with a few lesser-known ones in the mix. We spent some time after reading through it looking up and listening to several of the rhymes in their song form.

I read Hey Diddle Diddle and other Mother Goose Rhymes. I would use this in my classroom to teach nursery rhymes and to focus on rhyming words and parts of poem.

Lovely illustrations to accompany each Mother Goose rhyme. It was wonderful to reread this book. I wonder if many young children and parents still read Mother Goose rhymes.

Nice collection of poems.

This book is more of a collection of nursery rhymes, 46 in all. There are some great family favorites like Hey Diddle Diddle and Rain, Rain, go away. This storybook gives a fresh perspective on nursery rhymes and provides a comic relief throughout the story by including some very comical pictures. This book is a great introduction to a variety of nursery rhymes for your preparation of a rhyming unit.

Tomie dePaola has truly gone over the top in this traditional literature storybook. Not only does this story have vivid pictures, great stories, and amazing word choice, people of all ages would enjoy this book and appreciate the splendor in the artwork. This book would be a great addition to your own personal library or to your classroom. This book would become a great asset to a Literature class when looking at the different versions of nursery rhymes and how imagery plays a significant part in a story.

This book fits in the category as Traditional Literature which is very clear to understand, I am also placing this story in the trait: word choice because of the powerful combinations between graphics and text. The author uses descriptive, along with strong word choice which results in imagery. You will not be disappointed.

A great mentor text that talks about Nursery Rhymes in a unique way is: Previously by Allan Ahlberg

“HEY DIDDLE DIDDLE & other Mother Goose Rhymes” is just what is sounds like it would be, a collection of Mother Goose Poems. It includes 46 poems ranging from the common, Rain, rain, go away to less popular ones such as Come, butter, come. There is a lot of poetic devices in these Mother Goose Poems. Rhyme, rhythm, and repetition are very strong in these poems. This book would be good for nursery ages with such simple poems as Humpty Dumpty and Pat a cake, pat a cake, baker’s man, while primary ages would be better fitted with poems such as Old Mother Hubbard and Simple Simon met a pieman . All of the poems are illustrated using bright colors to add to the playfullness of the poems. The design stands out on several of the poems including one that is framed with sheep. Another has illustrations after each line and yet another has the poem framed in the castle wall. Although I would recommend this book for nursery age, due to some very cute rhymes, I would not recommend it for primary age children. I think a lot of the language is dated and do not think the subjects would engage todays primary age reader.

Hey Diddle Diddle & Other Mother Goose Rhymes
dePaola, Tomie
a collection of popular nursery rhymes

Nostalgia. This was my favorite book when I was little. The art and cute little rhymes took me back.

Fun illustrations to a more complete, but old-fashioned, text of Mother Goose.