Nursery World - Learning & Development: Froebel

Singing has a long tradition in nurseries, thanks largely to the work of Friedrich Froebel, and the practice is intimate and complex, explain Sacha Powell, Kathy Goouch and Louie Werth

Walk into a nursery in the UK and the chances are you will hear someone singing with the children. Peep through the window and you’ll see a lot of the singing is accompanied by hand gestures and other actions. We have Friedrich Froebel to thank for the promotion of singing as an educational activity, and songs and finger rhymes as tools to enhance children’s learning experiences. But this is just a glimpse into Froebel’s world, in which he attributed complex meaning and purpose to singing – and, of course, not all singing and all nursery songs convey a Froebelian philosophy.

Froebel spent many years observing and noting children’s songs and games before embarking on his own Mother Songs book. He believed that songs and the closeness involved in the act of singing would help adults and babies to make intimate, emotional connections, and that the babies’ responses within these singing encounters would convey their interests to those caring for them.

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