(a song about pattern)
Two distinct alien characters, the Gribbles and the Pops, line up in repeating sequences, inviting children to notice, copy, and predict what comes next. The song introduces different pattern structures (such as AB, BBA, and AAAB) through both visual and musical rhythm simultaneously, with a swinging beat. Children are invited to copy the pattern in the relevant sections of the song.
This is a bespoke video made to help illustrate the mathematical ideas in the song. It also contains a picture-in-picture view of one of our team demonstrating the gestures in the song.
This is a close-up video of one of our team demonstrating the gestures for the song.
This is a recording of both the instrumental and the vocal parts of the song so you can learn it, or to sing along to.
This is a recording of the instrumental parts of the song so you can sing along. It doesn’t have any vocals apart from backing vocals.
This is the music for the song (vocal line and backing) written out on the stave. We have included chords so that instruments like the guitar can be used. The music may be slightly simplified in parts to help with ease of playing.
This is the lyrics for the song written out in verses and choruses for ease of learning.
This is some background on the mathematics and vocabulary in the song and our suggestions as to how to use it in the classroom and at home to help bring out the mathematics. There are suggested activities to enrich some of the ideas from the song.
© 2026 Tappy Math(s) project.
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Licence: Creative Commons CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 Licence.