Miss Polly Has a Dolly

This is one that I like to chant to my children.  The rhythm is obvious and the lines end with repeating words, so kids really latch on to it.  They love to play-act along. Sometimes my kids are the “dolly,” sometimes they use their favorite stuffed animal or doll.

Thanks to this cute bookby Pamela Duncan Edwards and Elicia Castaldi, we discovered that there is also a melody. It’s moderately difficult but so fun!

Miss Polly had a dolly who was sick, sick, sick,

She called for the doctor to come quick, quick, quick.

The doctor came with his bag and his hat,

And he knocked on the door with a ra-ta-tat-tat.

He looked at the dolly and he shook his head,

And he said, “Miss Polly put her straight to bed,”

He wrote on a paper for a pill, pill, pill,

I’ll be back in the morning with my bill, bill, bill.