Boo-urp! There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat by Lucille Colandro

There was an old lady
Who swallowed a bat.
I don't know why
She swallowed a bat.
Imagine that!

Lucille Callandro's lively take-offs on the beloved folk song include There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat!, an evergreen spoof just right for reading and singing aloud during the spooky season.

For preschool and primary audiences, there's no form better than the rhyming cumulative tale for group participation, but even a single listener couldn't resist chiming in on these hilarious and predictable rhymes. The omnivorous old lady swallows an owl to shush the bat, a cat to hush the owl, a ghost to catch the cat, a goblin to scare the ghost, some bones to rattle the goblin, and at last, to reach the long-awaited climax. . .

There was an old lady
Who swallowed a wizard,
To cast a spell,
So she could yell...

TRICK OR TREAT!

A worthy companion to all those wonderful weird sisters--old ladies that swallow things--Allison Jackson's I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie (Picture Puffins), Terri Sloat's There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Trout, and Colandro's There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed Some Snow, this version is too much fun to miss during the Halloween season.