Module 2-Book 3 Folk Poetry

1. Bibliography
Schwartz, Alvin. 1992. And the Green Grass Grew All Around:
Folk Poetry From Everyone. Ill.by Sue Truesdell.
New York,NY:Harper Collins.ISBN:0060227583

2. Plot Summary
"Stare,Stare like a bear
Sitting in your underwear."
A collection of the folk poetry, street chants, jump-rope rhymes,ball bouncing songs, and hide-n-go seek call-outs that make up the soundtrack to childhood.
Schwartz approaches his subject matter with an inexhaustible curiosity,an eye for detail and a good ear for the poetry of the street.

The author proves himself to be a keen observer of street-lore and collects his material from a wide variety of sources. He talks to children from many geographical regions ranging from Appalachia to New York City.

Author Alvin Schwartz,who is very thorough, has all the loony and hilarious rhymes,parodies, and poetry divided into categories such as Food, School, Teases and Taunts, Love and Marriage and Work. There are many other categories,but a listing of these particular categories proves that there is a ridiculous rhyme for every occasion. Schoolyard chants pretty much cover Birth, Death and everything in between. Through his collection,Schwartz proves that children are not that sheltered from the harsh realities of life. Instead,children prefer to deal with harsh realities by turning to nonsense.

There is also a charming introduction in which Schwartz recounts his first playground "hazing" and his personal discovery in the schoolyard of taunts and chants.
He also provides the musical notation for some of the songs. This way they can be reproduced by any school music teacher.
3 Critical Analysis
Although the latest rhymes in this collection come from the late 1980's,they still seem fresh and funny.
The notes in the back of the book should not be skipped over. They are especially interesting because they mention the name of the individual child who supplied each rhyme. This serves as wonderful proof that these goofy rhymes could never be fashioned by a professional writer,but are sung by real children from San Francisco to San Antonio. As they are so crucial to understanding the history and development of street rhymes,perhaps they should be interspersed as end notes at the conclusion of each chapter. It seems as if these very important list of sources and notes would be overlooked because they are stuck in the back of the book.

The author also helpfully supplies and index of first lines, a very exhaustive bibliography,and some very enlightening, surprising and memorable histories of these rhymes in the notes section. Before I read this book,for example, I had no idea that eeny,meeny, miny,moe was derived from the celtic numbers for counting sheep.This is a fascinating book that I will turn to again and again.

The whimsical illustrations by Sue Truesdell work well with the nonsensical nature of the rhymes.


4 Review Excerpts
School Library Journal " A marvelous book that is sure to become a classic if children have any say in the matter."

The Horn Book"Full of vigorous, swinging rhythms and funny, often nasty, sentiments, the pages are filled with well-known rhymes as well as new discoveries."


5 Connections
Children can tape record the playground chants that they know and share them with their friends. Have students collect some folk rhymes from their parents.

Other books about folk-rhymes and playground chants include:
Withers, Carl. Rocket in my pocket. ISBN-13: 978-0805008043
Sierra,Judy. Shoolyard Rhymes..ISBN-13: 978-0375825163
Yolen,Jane. Street Rhymes around the World.ISBN-13: 978-1563978944
Kids who loved the silly poems in this book will love the goofy poems in Shel Silverstein's Where the Sidewalk Ends. ISBN-13: 978-0060572341

Children might also enjoy clapping along with the songs on the compact Disc, Brazilian Playground, available through the Putumayo Kids record label.