✦ A Nursery Rhyme ✦

Pat-a-Cake

A traditional Mother Goose nursery rhyme

Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, baker’s man, bake me a cake as fast as you can! The clapping rhyme that babies have loved for over three hundred years.

Watch the Read-Aloud Read the Rhyme

Read aloud by Storyland Classics  ✦  28 seconds  ✦  Watch on YouTube

✦ The Rhyme ✦

Pat-a-Cake

Traditional English nursery rhyme. Public domain.

Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, baker’s man, Bake me a cake as fast as you can; Pat it and prick it, and mark it with B, And put it in the oven for Baby and me.

✦ About the Rhyme ✦

A Clapping Rhyme

“Pat-a-Cake” is one of the oldest nursery rhymes still in use. A version appeared in a play by Thomas D’Urfey in 1698.

It is a clapping game: two people pat their hands together in rhythm. Families often swap the “B” for the first letter of the child’s own name.

✦ Talk About It ✦

Questions to Share

  • What does the baker’s man make?
  • What letter is the cake marked with?
  • Which letter would you put on your cake?

✦ Keep Reading ✦

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