Nursery Rhymes and Mother Goose Overview

The first written form of children’s literature came from the nursery rhymes in Mother Goose’s Melodies. This was a compilation of formerly oral stories for children. These stories were meant to teach kids lessons about everyday life and to, of course, entertain them and the whole family. Mother Goose was mainly the fictitious compiler of all these stories but she was also a main character in many of the stories. There is a difference between Mother Goose in England and Mother Goose in the American colonies. Mother Goose in England was original nursery rhymes compiled in England and written in England. But, although many of these nursery rhymes were in fact brought over to the states the Mother Goose books made in the United States were from nursery rhymes originally made in the colonies instead of ones taken from the English. It is thought that Mother Goose is either a group of poets who decided to use a name to compile all their children stories into one easy book. Others think that mother goose was one person. It’s possible that mother goose could have been Elizabeth Foster Goose who lived in Boston and was the wife of Isaac Goose. Regardless of who actually wrote those nursery rhymes they had an incredible effect on the upbringing of colonial children. Children read these nursery rhymes and learned moral and educational things about life. They were presented in a manner that was easy to understand but at the same time taught the consequences of certain wrong doings.