Learning your ABCs and 123s are perhaps the most broad and basic themes an educational children’s televion show could take. Nickelodeon offers a roster of their most popular shows (at least, those designed for pre-schoolers) to cover said topics in two seperate DVD releases. Each DVD is virtually identical in structure. There only difference are to particular episodes chosen from each show.
Each release provides more than 2 hours of viewing with a lineup of shows that includes Team Umizoomi, Ni Hao Kai-lan, the strange mini-opera that is Wonder Pets, and the immensely popular Nickelodeon staples Go, Diego Go!, Dora the Explorer, and Blue’s Clues. Hopefully the young viewers of these DVDs enjoy diversity as the program never stays the same for more than an episode, save for Team Umizoomi getting two in the “123s” DVD and Wonder Pets getting two in “ABCs.”
Some of these shows are not actually specifically covering ABCs or 123s for kids. Wonder Pets , for example, doesn’t go by such themes but intstead features stories about rescuing characters from Nursery rhymes such as the Itsy Bitsy Spider. This makes the DVD feel like a pretty random compilation that feels more like a sampler platter than something aimed at educating kids on a particular topic. Really though, the young children this is targeted at will hardly notice this fact if at all.
Perhaps I’ve mentioned this before but many of these shows use the tactic of having character pause and stare blankly at the camera in anticipation of a crowd response to questions they ask. This is incredibly eerie if you do not have a toddler around to shout responses. It almost makes you want to shout ANYTHING just to fill the void. For fun I’d answer questions with response no toddler would fathom such as when I’d hollar words like “quixotic!” at the screen.
Both DVDs come with a little activity worksheet for the kids to practice on. It means ruining the jacket of the DVD but that’s not a major concern for young kids who have yet to learn to read anyhow. There are no special features on either disc.
