Children's songs: My present is a black sofa

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Song words and audio for this popular song, plus activities to bring the song alive.

There's great language practice here: colours, concrete nouns – things around the house, is/are and a / an as well as rising intonation within unfinished lists. The singer also gets progressively more angry as the song goes on and young children will enjoy copying this. All these can be introduced or practised before or after listening to the song.

During the song

The gap fill activity below encourages children to listen out for the names of the colours, recognise them and also spell them correctly. You could gap out the nouns instead:

On day one my present is a _____ sofa

On day two my presents are a ______ table and a _____ sofa

On day three my presents are a _____ chair, a ______ table and
a _____ sofa

On day four my presents are a ____ bed, a _____ chair, a _____ table and

a _____ sofa

On day five my presents are an _____ ruler, a ____ bed, a _____ chair,

a ______ table and a _____ sofa

On day six my presents are a _____ dog, an ______ ruler, a ____ bed,

a _____ chair, a ______ table and a _____ sofa

On day seven my presents are a ___ ant, a _____ dog, an _____ ruler,

a ____ bed, a _____ chair, a _____ table and a _____ sofa

On day eight my presents are a ______ fish, a ___ ant, a _____ dog,

an _____ ruler, a ____ bed, a _____ chair, a _____ table and a _____ sofa

On day nine my presents are a ____ book, a ______ fish, a ___ ant,

a _____ dog, an ______ ruler, a ____ bed, a ______ chair, a ______ table

and a ______ sofa

On day ten my presents are a _____ football, a ____ book, a ______ fish,

a ___ ant, a _____dog, an ______ ruler, a ____ bed, a _____ chair,

a _____ table and a _____ sofa

Another activity to do while listening to the song is a colouring activity that is extremely good practice for the listening part of the Cambridge YL Exam, in which children listen to a description and have to colour the objects correctly. Children listen to the song and choose the item that is being described and colour it in e.g. they hear pink bed – they identify the bed in the picture and colour it in pink. You may need to play the song a number of times and reassure the children that they will have plenty of time to complete the task