The baby at 0-2 months has difficulty in distinguishing similar color tones, so they prefer black-and-white or high-contrast objects. My baby twins liked to stare at the black and white pictures on the books, "Black on White" and "White on Black" (both by Tana Hoban). They also liked to look at the color pages on "Colors and Shapes-Baby touch and feel (DK Publisers) and all the animals on "Animal-My First Board Book " ( (DK Publishers Ltd).
My children like to listen to music since they were born. When they were babies, the things they liked most include: Walt Disney Children 's favorite songs, 100 sing along songs for kids (Cedarmont Kids), and Sleepytime Lullabies.
My sister got the Baby Genius for them when they were 6 months old. This DVD set contains Mozart & Friend, Animal Adventures, Under Water Adventures and A trip to the San Diego Zoo. The DVDs combine different images such as animals, children, alphabets, numbers and shapes, with classical music. Baby Genius was released on 2002. I had never heard of it until my sister gave them to us. It has not been heavily advertised in recent years. In contrast, a similar product, Baby Einstein, has more DVDs in collection and they are relatively popular. My Children were having fun with Baby Genius and we did not get the Baby Einstein. I did not think that they should spend too much time watching DVDs in such young ages. I liked to play Baby Genius in the car, the classical music was so soothing and babies always fast fell asleep.
A couple of DVD caught their eyes after their first birthday. One is the Maisy (Lucy Cousins). The little mouse lives in
a yellow house with red roof. She and her friends: Charlie the crocodile, Tallulach the baby chicken, Cyril the squirrel and Eddie the elephant, have a lot of fun playing together. In this program, the characters are cute, their personalities are consistent in each episode, and the drawing is very colorful. It is a very good show for toddlers. The speed of story is perfect, both of my children loved Maisy and her little friends. Because the size of Maisy is relatively larger than a mouse and she has a long nose, at the beginning, I thought she was a rat. My husband needed to correct me that Maisy is supposed to be a mouse. We figured out that she is girl since she wears skirt sometime. The US post office even published 39 cents postage stamps featuring Maisy. She appears to be popular.
The other one is the Yoho Ahoy (BBC). Stories about a group of pirates aboard the ship named "Rubber Duck". It is an animated puppets, the main characters include: Captain Bilge, Cutlass (pirate), Swab (first mate), Poop (the cabin boy), Jones (engineer), Grog (the cook) and Booty (the only girl in the ship). Different from Maisy, Yoho Ahoy is a clay animation. It offers beautiful color, interesting sound effects and funny stories to Children. Cutlass is always naughty, Jones is very disciplined, Grog is creative, Poop is always sleepy and Booty is bossy. Everybody in happy in Yoho Ahoy.
