Sixty Seconds Make a Minute Lyrics
The speaker recites the units of time: sixty seconds in a minute, sixty minutes in an hour, twenty-four hours in a day, seven days in a week, four weeks in a month and twelve months in a year. In between the child wishes to be a bird that does not have to learn them.
Sixty Seconds Make a Minute
"Sixty seconds make a minute,
Sixty minutes make an hour;"
If I were a little linnet,
Hopping in her leafy bower,
Then I should not have to sing it:
"Sixty seconds make a minute."
Twenty-four hours make a day,
Seven days will make a week;
And while we all at marbles play,
Or run at cunning "hide and seek,"
Or in the garden gather flowers,
We'll tell the time that makes the hours.
In every month the weeks are four,
And twelve whole months will make a year;
Now I must say it o'er and o'er,
Or else it never will be clear;
So once again I will begin it:
"Sixty seconds make a minute."
Printed from https://nurseryrhymes.co/sixty-seconds-make-a-minute/
- Type
- Poems for Children
- Tune
- A chanted lesson, steady and singsong, with the first line as a repeating chorus
- Best for ages
- 5 to 9 years
Hand Motions and Actions
| When you sing | Do this |
|---|---|
| "Sixty seconds make a minute." | Tap your foot once for each beat as you say it, counting a few seconds. |
| Seven days will make a week; | Count seven fingers up, one for each day. |
What Does Sixty Seconds Make a Minute Mean?
The poem is a memory chant dressed up as a story. A child is trying to learn how time is divided, and says the lesson out loud: sixty seconds make a minute, sixty minutes make an hour, then twenty-four hours make a day, seven days will make a week, the weeks are four in a month and twelve whole months will make a year. The child says it over and over, because otherwise it never will be clear, and begins again with the first line.
One verse is a daydream. If the child were a linnet, a small songbird, hopping in a leafy bower, a shady spot among leaves, there would be no need to sing this list. The numbers are right, with one rounded figure: months are made of roughly four weeks each, which is close enough for a children's rhyme, since real months run from 28 to 31 days.
History and Origin
The 1911 revision of Mary O. Ward's 1884 songbook for small children includes this time-telling verse. A different rhyme with the same facts is Christina Rossetti's How Many Seconds in a Minute?, from 1872.
Learning Activities
- Clock talk: point to a clock and find the second hand, the minute hand and the hour hand.
- One minute: time a minute together and see how much the child can do, such as hopping or clapping, in sixty seconds.
- Calendar chant: read the days of the week and the months aloud from a calendar.
- Be the linnet: hop like a little bird as you say the verse about the bower.