What does Hey Diddle Diddle mean?
A gloriously silly rhyme where a cat plays a fiddle, a cow jumps over the moon, a dog laughs, and a dish runs off with a spoon. It is pure nonsense and imagination, and it is not meant to make sense.
What Hey Diddle Diddle teaches
Beyond being fun to sing, this rhyme quietly builds several early skills:
- Imagination and playful, silly ideas
- New words like fiddle and sport
- Animals and the sounds of a bouncy rhyme
- That words can be fun just for fun
When your child knows it well, our coloring pages for kids carry the same early skills into playful practice.
Where Hey Diddle Diddle comes from
Hey Diddle Diddle is an English nonsense rhyme printed around 1765. A fiddle is another name for a violin, and "sport" here is an old word for fun.
Fun activities
- Draw the cow jumping over the moon
- Make up your own silly line, like a fish riding a bike
- Act out each funny part as you sing
Frequently asked questions
What are the words to Hey Diddle Diddle?
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.
What does Hey Diddle Diddle mean?
It is a nonsense rhyme, so it is not supposed to mean anything. The fun is in the silly, impossible pictures it puts in your head.
What is a fiddle in Hey Diddle Diddle?
A fiddle is another word for a violin. In the rhyme, the cat is playing one.