TICK TOCK MUSIC

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Geraldine Mannion started Tick Tock in May 1992 in Islington London. It is a children's music group for under 5's run by professionally trained and highly experienced actors and singers operating 36 weeks of the academic year.

In each 45-minute session we sing a selection of nursery rhymes and songs old and new, with a different programme each week. The songs and rhymes are dramatised and linked by a narrative thread. The children are invited to act out some of the characters in the songs, or interact with props and animals.

As well as Islington N1 there are groups at Morden SW20, New Malden KT3, Crouch End N8, and Muswell Hill N10. ....more

There are many reasons for using music and rhymes with young children.

• Firstly and most importantly, children and adults enjoy it enormously.
• Nursery rhymes, poems and songs have a vital impact on early learning and they are a traditional part of childhood happiness for everyone.
• The stories and characters of nursery rhymes fascinate young children and help them think imaginatively.
• They encourage number and letter recognition, pre-reading skills, excellent speech practice and voice control, as well as being lots of fun.
• Feeling and beating rhythm and hearing counting rhymes encourages early number ideas. The repeated pattern and sequence of words and rhythms are good memory exercises.

There are a variety of visual aids, numbers, colours etc. to stimulate the children. Some children who sit quietly through a session may seem to participate little but will go home and sing the songs that they didn't appear to know in the group.

Everyone can join in at their own level and pace, whether it is just listening, clapping hands or doing simple actions.We would like mums, dads, carers, nannies and grannies to sing along and encourage their children to join in our unique blend of music, drama, movement, poems and participation.

©Tick Tock Music 2008