Hand Jive

When I was a child, I was intrigued by 'clapping games' or, as The King refers to it, 'Hand Jive.' It wasn't very popular here in Utah, possibly because it seems to be strongly associated with the African American community, which wasn't prominent in my neighborhood as a child. I would catch glimpses of these games on TV and thought it looked like fun, but aside from eventually learning "Say Say Oh Playmate" that was it. When I went to girls camp at about the age of 13, I learned 'Down By The Banks', but alas, my hand jive education came to an end.

Recently I've been thinking that it might be fun to teach The Princess some of these games. I've seen 4 and 5 year olds become quite skilled at these games, some with very intricate hand moves, so she should be able to learn them. I've started looking on the internet for more chants, but it's difficult to find ones that have instructions for the movement. Perhaps that's a part of the beauty of 'hand jive'... making up your own actions! I am not good at this. Maybe The Princess' African American's heritage will lend her this talent? One can always hope.

Something else I never realized is how ribald some of this material is. I'm looking for the clean stuff, but I have to admit that this version of 'Mary Had A Little Lamb' had The King and I laughing hysterically. You can view a video of it here.

Mary had a little lamb
She also had a duck
she took him round the corner
and taught him how to
fry an eggs for breakfast
fry your eggs for tea
the more you eat
the more drink
the more you want to
Peter had a boat
the boat began to rock
out jumped jaws
and bit him on the
cocktail, ginger ale, forty cents a glass
if you don't drink then
shove it up your
ask no questions
tell no lies
I saw two policemen
doing up their
flies are bad, mosquitoes are worse
I saw the doctor
lying on the nurse
nurse him well
if you don't you will go to
helicopter, helicopter turn around,
If you crash you'll fall to the ground!

Were there any clapping songs you learned as a kid that I can teach my 7-year old daughter and ensure that she won't be getting kicked out of school for? :)

So far my 'clean' collection includes 'Miss Mary Mack', 'Double Double This That', and 'My Aunty Anna'. I would love to find a longer version of 'Down, Down, Baby' - the first part is fine, but then it always gets a little ribald.

By the way, the word of the day is ribald.