Lesson 10: songs and games for kids

Kenyan children learn half their Kiswahili in the playground: clapping games, riddles shouted across a classroom, action songs in nursery school and the national anthem at school assembly. If you are raising Kenyan-American children, or taking any children to Kenya, songs are the quickest way in. A child who arrives able to sing one song and answer one riddle gets pulled into a game within minutes.

This last lesson is built for families. It uses only traditional words, which belong to everyone, and rhymes we wrote ourselves for this course. Two famous songs, Jambo Bwana and Malaika, are copyrighted, so we tell their stories instead of printing them. There is no new grammar: every line reuses something from Lessons 1 to 9, so it doubles as a review of the whole course.

What your children will be able to do

• Sing an action song and name eight parts of the body
• Play the riddle game the way Kenyan children do
• Join in common playground games
• Sing the first verse of the Kenyan national anthem
• Count to ten and greet in song

1. Kichwa, mabega, magoti, vidole

Head, shoulders, knees and toes, sung in Kiswahili to the traditional tune in many Kenyan nursery schools. This is the wording we use; touch each part as you sing it, and go faster every round.

• Kichwa, mabega, magoti, vidole, magoti, vidole
• Kichwa, mabega, magoti, vidole, magoti, vidole
• Macho, masikio, mdomo na pua
• Kichwa, mabega, magoti, vidole, magoti, vidole

2. Kitendawili! Tega! The riddle game

Riddles are a game with a fixed opening. The asker calls Kitendawili! (a riddle!) and everyone answers Tega! (set it!). Then comes the riddle, and the first right answer wins. In the traditional version, if nobody can solve it, the asker claims a prize, a town, before revealing the answer. Three classic riddles to start with:

• Nyumba yangu haina mlango. (My house has no door.) Answer: yai, an egg.
• Popote niendapo hunifuata. (Wherever I go, it follows me.) Answer: kivuli, my shadow.
• Nikimpiga mwanangu, watu hucheza. (When I beat my child, people dance.) Answer: ngoma, a drum.

3. Playground games

• Kati: a dodgeball game. Two throwers stand at either end of a strip of ground and try to hit the players in the middle (kati means middle) with a ball, often home-made from plastic bags tied with string.
• Kalongolongo: playing house and cooking, with leaves, mud and old tins as food and pots, the game in which children rehearse being mama and baba.
• Bano: marbles, played into a small hole scooped in the ground.
• Brikicho: hide and seek, as many Kenyan children call it.
• Simama, kaa: our classroom version of Simon says, and a good way to teach verbs. The leader calls Simama! (stand), Kaa! (sit), Ruka! (jump), Kimbia! (run) and Lala! (lie down), faster and faster, and anyone who moves wrongly is out.

4. Our counting rhyme and greeting song

We wrote these for this course, so print them, sing them and share them. The counting rhyme uses the present tense from Lesson 2 and the animals from Lesson 7:

• Moja, mbili, tatu: twiga anatembea (one, two, three: the giraffe is walking)
• Nne, tano, sita: simba analala (four, five, six: the lion is sleeping)
• Saba, nane, tisa: tembo anakunywa maji (seven, eight, nine: the elephant is drinking water)
• Kumi! Tumefika! (ten! we've arrived!)

The greeting song goes to the tune of Frère Jacques (Are you sleeping, Brother John?), a traditional round, and uses Lesson 1:

• Mambo? Poa! Mambo? Poa!
• Karibu, karibu.
• Asante, rafiki, asante, rafiki,
• Kwaheri, kwaheri.

5. The national anthem, first verse

Ee Mungu Nguvu Yetu (O God, our strength) was written in Kiswahili by a commission in 1963 for independence and set to a traditional tune that Pokomo mothers sang to their children. Kenyan children sing it at school assemblies, and everyone stands still when it plays; a visiting child who can sing the first verse will be noticed.

• Ee Mungu nguvu yetu
• Ilete baraka kwetu
• Haki iwe ngao na mlinzi
• Natukae na undugu
• Amani na uhuru
• Raha tupate na ustawi.

Word for word: O God our strength, bring blessing to us; may justice be our shield and defender; let us live in unity, peace and freedom; may we find happiness and prosperity. The official English version, sung to the same tune, begins O God of all creation, bless this our land and nation.

Two famous songs we will not print

Jambo Bwana was first released in 1982 by the Kenyan band Them Mushrooms and became the hotel song of East Africa, covered by many bands and by Boney M. It is where most visitors pick up jambo, nzuri sana and hakuna matata. The lyrics are copyrighted, so listen to an official recording and sing along; Lesson 1 explains why Kenyans greet each other with habari and mambo instead.

Malaika, angel, is the best-known Kiswahili love song. It is usually credited to the Tanzanian songwriter Adam Salim, who is said to have written it in Nairobi in the mid-1940s; it was first recorded by the Kenyan singer Fadhili William, and its authorship is still disputed. It is not a children's song, but children love the tune; listen to a recording together and talk about what malaika means.

How diaspora parents use this lesson

• One song a week in the car for the ten weeks before the trip
• The riddle game at dinner, with the children asking the riddles
• Video calls where the children sing for their grandparents, and the grandparents sing back
• Recording grandparents singing the songs of their own childhood, in Kiswahili or your mother tongue, before they are forgotten
• Saturday Kiswahili classes and cultural days run by Kenyan community groups in many U.S. cities

Practice: a review of the course

• 1. Someone calls Kitendawili! What do you answer? Answer: Tega!
• 2. Nyumba yangu haina mlango. Answer: yai.
• 3. Point to your mdomo. Answer: your mouth.
• 4. What is the singular of vidole? Answer: kidole.
• 5. What does tumefika mean, and which lesson is its tense from? Answer: we've arrived; the -me- perfect from Lesson 7.
• 6. In twiga anatembea, what does -na- tell you? Answer: it is happening now, the present from Lesson 2.
• 7. Greet your grandmother respectfully. Answer: Shikamoo, bibi. She replies: Marahaba.

You have finished the course

Ten lessons: greetings, introductions, numbers, the market, directions, family, animals, time, proverbs and songs. That is enough Kiswahili to greet, shop, travel, meet the family and follow a game drive, and far more than most visitors arrive with. The next step is to use it. Our Learn Kiswahili hub lists language schools and homestays in Kenya for anyone who wants to go further. And remember Lesson 9: haba na haba hujaza kibaba, little by little fills the measure.