Round and Round the Garden

Round and round the garden like a teddy bear. One step, two step. Tickley under there!

This is a traditional rhyme based on the actions of walking your fingers around a child's hand, then walking up their arm with "one step, two step" before tickling them under the arm.

it's thought to have been based on an older rhyme: "Round about there sat a little hare, the bow-wows came and chased him, right up there"
other variations include "round the racecourse, catch a little hare" and "round the garden like a wee mouse, up the stair and in the wee house"

The Teddy Bear version was first collected in Britain in the late 1940s.
The name Teddy Bear comes from Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt, when in 1902 he refused to shoot a captured bear on a hunting trip, stating that it would be unsporting. American toy maker Morris Michtom saw a cartoon of the incident in The Washington Post and made a toy bear. He sent one to Roosevelt and got permission to call it "Teddy's bear". At the same time in Germany, Steiff, unaware of Michtom's bear, started producing toy bears as well.

The most famous teddy bear is perhaps Edward Bear - better know as Winnie-the-pooh, after a confusing name change due to a real bear in london zoo called Winnie and a Swan called Pooh.
All this adding to the popularity of the Teddy means that today it is one of the most popular toys and round the garden is as popular as ever.

For this version of round and round the garden, a family of bears has turned up at a secret garden where two of the young bears play a chasing and tickling game.
- Ed Hartwell

Video Credits:
Produced by Sarah Simi & Ed Hartwell (Woolly Vision)
Animation and Direction: Ed Hartwell
Art Direction: Sarah Simi
Puppets: Caroline Bletsis
Set Elements and Props: Leeanne Bell
Music performed by Gemma Storr
Recorded by Steve Pretty
Giggles by Little H.