Student Writing Handbook Fifth+Edition

Research Paper / 323

Commens 5

The values of Mother Goose are many: as an introduction to literature, as a child’s companion,

as a source of happiness and contentment, as a stimulant to his imagination, and as a catalyst

in the child’s learning process.

Mother and teacher agree that the best of these verses have an even more potent

influence.... The healthy moral, so subtly suggested in many of the rhymes, is

unconsciously absorbed by the child’s receptive mind, helping him to make his own

distinction between right and wrong, bravery and cowardice, generosity and self-

ishness (Grover 1).

Surely, then, it is no wonder the Mother Goose rhymes have survived generations of critics.

In fact, without the Mother Goose rhymes as part of his childhood, a youngster may suffer a

social if not an educational handicap.