Little Einsteins Is the Next Logical Step

At some point, the marketing guys at Disney must have sat down and realized that their Baby Einstein audience was getting older. Hoping to capitalize on the success of the Baby Einstein line, Disney developed Little Einsteins as the next step for their aging audience of little geniuses.

Little Einsteins is a television show airing on Disney television and available on DVD. The animation is an odd but unique combination of cartoon characters and photo images. Young cartoon children, Annie, Quincy, June, and Leo travel around the world and beyond in Rocket, a red flying submarine/spacecraft. In each episode, the Little Einsteins characters go on a mission. To complete each mission, the children must decipher clues that involve music, art, geography, animals, etc.

Little Einsteins is intended for children three- to six-years old; however, unusually bright one- and two-year olds may find the show interesting.

Plaza Sesamo: The Fun Way to Learn Basic Spanish

Plaza Sesamo, the Spanish Sesame Street, is not only for Spanish-speakers but also for those who want a fun and easy introduction to conversational Spanish. If you want to introduce your child to the sounds and intonations of Spanish, Plaza Sesamo is a great place to start.

Plaza Sesamo’s audience is primarily composed of preschoolers who speak only rudimentary Spanish. To keep things easy to understand, the vocabulary on Plaza Sesamo is very basic, and the sentences are very short and simple. Also, like virtually all children’s programming, the communication is highly expressive and includes an abundance of visual aids. The result is a constant flow of Spanish communication that could not be any easier to understand.

Watching Plaza Sesamo will not magically give your child the ability to speak fluent Spanish, but the show will definitely give the child a taste of the language that could serve as a stepping stone when beginning formal Spanish training in the future.

Plaza Sesamo: The Latino Sesame Street

Plaza Sesamo, Sesame Street’s Latino counterpart, premiered in Mexico and Latin America in 1972. Since its debut, Plaza Sesamo has thrilled millions of Spanish-speaking children.

Abelardo, Big Bird’s Latino cousin, is a giant green, red, pink, and yellow parrot. Much like Big Bird, Abelardo serves as the centerpiece of the show. Each episode, Abelardo and his friends, Lola, Pancho Contreras, Elefancio, etc. lead groups of children in peppy dances and songs as they explore the alphabet, numbers, etc. (All of this is in Spanish, of course.)

Just like Sesame Street, Plaza Sesamo incorporates animation clips and video segments. The show maintains an energetic and exciting pace to keep the attention of its easily distracted preschool audience.

You can find Plaza Sesamo on most major Spanish television stations.

The Red Green Show for Children

Red-green color blindness is more common than many people believe. About 7% of males and about 1% of females have red-green color blindness.

Red-green color blindness (dichromatism) is genetic and carried on the X chromosome. Fathers (XY) may pass it to only their daughters. Mothers (XX) may pass it to only their sons.

Red-green color blindness is not a serious affliction. It simply means that a red-green color-blind person has a defective color receptor and will have difficulty differentiating between the two colors. For this reason, do not be frustrated if your child becomes confused when red and green appear together.

If your child seems to have difficulty identifying red objects on green backgrounds and green objects on red backgrounds, consider limiting use of toys and teaching materials containing those color combinations. As soon as practical, have your child’s vision tested. Even if your child is color-blind, he or she will learn to cope. Millions of other people manage to deal with color blindness successfully every day.

Learn About the Zoo DVD Review

Learn About the Zoo just might be the worst educational video ever released. This video from Quest Media Inc. manages to fail in almost every area imaginable. The DVD case graphic includes the major mistake of displaying the tagline for a different production (Learn About Dinosaur ABC’s), and things just get worse from there.

The video’s premise of a class trip to the zoo via computer is weak and dull. The computer-generated graphics are horrendous and evoke Atari video games from the 1970s.

The most obvious problem with Learn About the Zoo is the presentation of the animals. Instead of live action video, this production takes a cheap shortcut by displaying photos. To make matters worse, the photos are of stunningly poor quality, and appear to be a collection of snapshots from a zoo trip and photos of 2D images. The images are grainy and washed out. In some photos, the animals are barely recognizable.

The most harmful feature of Learn About the Zoo is its unreliable information. The video contains factual errors and mispronunciations, giving this video negative educational value. Simply by missing this video, your child will have an advantage over children who have seen it.

If you have already made the mistake of purchasing Learn About the Zoo, you might consider returning it to the retailer and demanding a refund.

Baby Einstein DVDs Are a Brilliant Beginning

The Baby Einstein Company offers a library of developmental DVDs for babies. These DVDs are an excellent way to expose your baby to sound, color, and motion. (Click here to read about The Baby Einstein Company.)

In the second month, your baby should have just enough awareness to begin noticing the more basic Baby Einstein DVDs. Baby Mozart Music Festival is one of the more basic DVDs and seems to have a universal appeal among younger babies. To see if your baby is interested, put him or her in front of the television, play the Baby Mozart DVD, and watch your baby’s reaction. If your baby has a pleasant reaction, then he or she is ready. If your baby ignores the DVD or gets upset, he or she will need a few more weeks before watching the DVDs. Once your baby is showing interest in Baby Einstein DVDs, play them at will.

Your baby is likely to show a surprisingly high level of interest in the DVDs. Babies find these DVDs fascinating because they are specifically designed for their age group. The music is high-pitched and playful. The images are simple. The motions are easy to track. This is the perfect formula for capturing a baby’s attention.

The DVDs contain a variety of sounds and images that will help stimulate your baby’s brain. The on-screen motion will help the baby learn to focus and track with his or her eyes. The music will entertain and give the baby a broad assortment of sounds to help develop hearing.

There is one annoying thing about the most recent Baby Einstein DVDs. Since Disney took over the company, there has been a gradual push toward more advertising content on the DVDs. On some of the recent DVDs, the advertisements are pushed on the viewers. On some DVD players, you will not be able to skip over or fast-forward through commercials for Animal Kingdom, Little Einsteins, etc. The first few times you watch these advertisements, you might be a little interested; however, after you have seen them a dozen times, you will begin to get irritated. After a few months of seeing these advertisements, you will probably start having negative reactions to the material. Disney needs to rethink their policy of how they insert advertisements into their DVDs. Many people do not like to have advertisements inserted into DVDs they have purchased for personal use.

Even with the annoying advertisements on some of the recent titles, Baby Einstein DVDs are still a great tool for introducing babies to a world of sights and sounds. Your baby is bound to love the DVDs, and you will be amazed at how much of the information your baby will eventually absorb.

All About Big Red Fire Engines DVD Review

All About Big Red Fire Engines, from GoodTimes Entertainment, is a video that is presumably about fire engines. In reality, the video is about firefighters.

All About Big Red Fire Engines is essentially an orientation session focusing on what goes on in the typical day of a firefighter. The video includes many lengthy and dull demonstrations of all types of firefighting gear. What the video lacks is an adequate amount of engaging footage of fire engines and firefighters performing their jobs.

All About Big Red Fire Engines does provide some interesting information, but it delivers the information poorly. All About Big Red Fire Engines is a boring production that sparks little interest.

Tupperware Shape-O Toy Puzzle Ball

The Tupperware Shape-O is one of the most recognizable toys in the history of developmental products. This odd looking red and blue plastic sphere has long been a fixture of children’s playrooms. We’ve all seen those little yellow shapes scattered across the floor and many of us have had the pleasure of repeatedly opening and closing this contraption for excited toddlers.

For those of you who do not already own a Tupperware Shape-O, here are some of the product highlights and developmental benefits.

The coloring of the Shape-O is a bold palette of primary colors. The sphere is half red and half blue with assorted yellow pieces. These colors contrast well, which makes the toy attractive to small children and simple to use.

There are ten of the yellow pieces. Each piece represents a different shape (e.g., circle, triangle, square, etc.) On the surface of the sphere are ten corresponding holes. The object of the puzzle is to get each piece into its proper hole. This appears to simply be a game, but it is much more. The Shape-O is a tool for teaching the important developmental behavior of matching. As the child matches each piece to its corresponding hole, the child learns to study and compare each shape. By recognizing the differences and similarities between each shape, the child begins to build an understanding of space and proportion. This is a crucial step in developing the ability to interpret and differentiate more complex shapes.

Each yellow shape piece is numbered with digits and a corresponding quantity of dots. The numbers and dots make the Shape-O a helpful tool in teaching the child the concepts of numbers and counting.

The one negative feature of this product is the opening and closing mechanism. To open the sphere, you must pull handles at the poles of the sphere and twist the hemispheres in opposing directions for many rotations. The Shape-O’s red and blue hemispheres will eventually separate just enough for you to turn the Shape-O horizontal and vigorously shake the toy until all of the pieces fall to the floor. To close the empty Shape-O, you must spin the hemispheres in the opposite direction until the toy tightens down and the two hemispheres fit together snuggly. This procedure may sound simple, but you will quickly grow tired of all the work. Once your child masters this puzzle, you will start experiencing conflicting feelings. On one hand, you’ll be happy that your child is getting smarter, but you will grow to dread opening and closing the toy.

The good news is that the Shape-O is worth the effort. It is a wonderful developmental toy that will provide your child with hours of fun and some valuable lessons in shape, differentiation, counting, sorting, and memory.

Oh, and by the way, it’s Tupperware, so when your child’s Shape-O gets dirty (and it will), you can always toss the whole toy (pieces inside) into the dishwasher.

Tiny Love

Tiny Love is a company that produces developmental toys primarily for babies. They offer a nice selection of toys designed to fill specific developmental needs at specific growth stages.

Tiny Love is best known for its Gymini activity gyms and Symphony-in-Motion mobiles; however, they have a full line of products to aid in all of the developmental stages of the first year.

Black, White, and Red All Over: The Newborn’s Color Palette

Infants have awful eyesight. This may sound like a disadvantage, but it is actually nature’s way of sparing the baby from excessive visual stimulation.

Our world is full of light and colors. All of this visual stimulation has little impact on adults, because we have become accustomed to it. A newborn baby, however, has spent nine months in almost total darkness. The roughly 10,000,000 colors that the adult eye sees create far too much information for the newborn baby to process.

For this reason, newborns have been blessed with minimal eyesight. Newborns are near-sighted and see the world in fuzzy shapes and muted hues. What babies can see moderately well is contrasts, and no colors contrast better than black and white. Newborns also have the ability to detect red.

You should keep the newborn’s color palette in mind when selecting toys. Try to find toys that use black, white, and red. Also, look for toys that have bold patterns with clear lines and well-defined shapes. Remember that the newborn’s vision is very limited. Having toys that are easy to process visually will help your newborn learn to interpret shapes.

Learn About Dinosaur ABC’s DVD Review

Learn About Dinosaur ABC’s, distributed by Quest Media Inc. under the Treasure Box Collection label, is a low-budget animated production available on DVD. Roxy the Dinosaur is the poorly animated host of this half-hour program which consists of little more than static cartoon dinosaurs appearing one by one on-screen while the host provides a brief audio description of each one.

The information in the video is fairly useful, but the production values are poor to the point of being a significant distraction. The animation employs a minimal number of frames, making the action jerky and repetitive. The background audio is on a loop that repeats many times per minute. Basically, while the information may be good, there is nothing on-screen to hold a child’s attention. To make matters even worse, the DVD appears to be merely a transfer from videotape as evidenced by frequent tape glitches in the program.

The overwhelming poor quality of Learn About Dinosaur ABC’s makes this DVD a bad purchase. You will not have to look far to find a better educational video.

Baby Einstein: A Single Video Leads to a Learning Revolution

In 1997, suburban Denver mother, Julie Clark had a moment of brilliance. She imagined a simple video incorporating basic, colorful images set to music and voice that would capture and hold the attention of babies. She and her husband invested about $18,000 to produce a single Baby Einstein video. They got the video into stores, distribution grew, and a nation of parents began demanding more.

Within a few years, what had started out as a fairly modest investment, turned into a multi-million dollar business. The Walt Disney Company soon took notice of the dramatic success. Disney purchased Baby Einstein from Julie Clark in 2001 and kept her on as a consultant.

During the last several years, The Baby Einstein Company has managed to release many DVDs, toys, flashcards, books, etc. All of these materials can be valuable tools in teaching babies.

Jump into Learning with LeapFrog

LeapFrog Enterprises, Inc. is an educational toy and video company which is widely known for the revolutionary LeapPad electronic interactive reading tool. LeapFrog makes a wide variety of educational toys that promote basic learning skills through casual play. LeapFrog has a line of educational DVDs that teach letters, math, reading, etc. LeapFrog also has education products for children all the through way high school.

Making Your Own Flashcards

If you are having difficulty finding flashcards that meet your needs, you can always make your own. The advantage to making your own flashcards is that you can tailor them to your child’s particular interests.

You can design these cards using software like Microsoft Word, Microsoft Paint, CorelDraw, Adobe Illustrator, etc. and print them out on your own printer. When printing the cards, make sure to use the heaviest cardstock that your printer can handle. The thick material should hold up well over repeated uses.

Consider the color of the paper. You want the background to contrast well with the image on the flashcard. You will probably want to go with pale yellows, blues, and greens. If you want to make flashcards specifically for teaching colors, get some paper with vivid colors. Crayola makes a nice multi-pack of paper that includes vivid sheets of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. Colored cardstock is available at stores like Wal-Mart, Target, Staples, Office Depot, etc.

The ideal size for a flashcard is about 4" X 6". Cut the flashcards down to a uniform size and protect them with adhesive lamination sheets. Bind each set of flashcards with a rubber band. These flashcards will provide you and your child with hours of fun and learning.

Little Tikes Piano Hits a High Note

Through the years, Little Tikes has made several versions of a small piano/xylophone. This product is a good tool for teaching your child about music and the production of sound.

These Little Tikes pianos have large keys that are easy for babies to use. The pianos normally come in four- and eight-key models. The eight-key model contains a full octave and is far superior to the four-key model.

The main disadvantage to the Little Tikes piano is difficult cleaning. Over time, dust and crumbs fall through the keyboard and accumulate in the bottom of the piano. You will have to take the piano apart to do a proper cleaning.

With the exception of cleaning difficulties, the Little Tikes piano is an excellent tool for introducing your child to music and sound production.

Sesame Street Is the Fast Lane of Education

Sesame Street is the single most important show on television. Seasame Street first aired on November 10, 1969. Over the decades, the producers of the show have fine-tuned the process of education through entertainment and have made Sesame Street the standard in children’s educational entertainment.

The key to Sesame Street’s effectiveness is the show’s energetic format. Sesame Street takes the essence of early learning (colors, shapes, numbers, letters, etc.) and integrates them into fun, interesting, and quick segments. For example, Big Bird and Ernie may discuss the letter D, and then Ernie will flashback to a song he sang to Bert about the letter D. Elmo may tell Cookie Monster that his favorite number is 5, and then a quick music video about the number 5 will play. Many of these segments last just a few minutes (often less than a minute); however, the producers have managed to weave the segments together to create one seamless episode after another.

Parents who watch Sesame Street with their children on a regular basis will recognize many of the songs and skits that appear throughout almost every episode. Sesame Street has amassed such a tremendous library of material that the producers can pull from dozens of classic segments for almost any subject. Even though some of these segments go back decades, they still manage to be relevant. The reason why they are relevant is because the basics of learning have not changed, and young children today are a lot like young children were decades ago.

In the world of media, there are hundreds of examples of important programming; however, not one of them does as much to introduce small children to learning as Sesame Street. There is no more valuable hour of programming on television.

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