Hey Diddle Diddle The classic nonsense rhyme, with lyrics and a free printable

🎵 Hey Diddle Diddle Lyrics

One verse, six lines, and not a sensible thing in it — that is the design. Read it out loud and let the pictures land one at a time.

Hey diddle diddle,
The cat and the fiddle,
The cow jumped over the moon;
The little dog laughed
To see such sport,
And the dish ran away with the spoon.

🌙 About This Rhyme

Hey Diddle Diddle has no actions and no lesson — it is a nonsense rhyme, and its play is sound and pictures. A cat plays an instrument, a cow clears the moon in one jump, a dog laughs at the show, and the dish elopes with the spoon. Children who know perfectly well that cows cannot jump over the moon enjoy it precisely because it breaks the rules so completely.

That makes it a natural animal-sounds game: pause at each animal and let your child supply the meow, the moo and the little dog's laugh before you read on. Nobody knows who wrote it — it has been printed in Mother Goose collections since the 1700s, passed along because it is fun to say.

🖨️ How to Use This Rhyme

1. Read it with voices. A different voice for the cat, the cow and the little dog makes the nonsense twice as funny.
2. Pause for the sounds. Stop at each animal and let your child make its sound before you read the next line.
3. Print the lyrics sheet. Six short lines in big print — point at each line as you say it together.
4. Let your child “read” it back. From memory, from the pictures in their head, from the sheet — all of it counts as early reading.