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If you've been around babies in the last few years, you've seen these newfangled toys that are abstract in color (or just black, white, and red) and make curious, crunching noises. Studies have shown that these types of toys stimulate newborns, expanding the capacity of their little sponge-like minds. That concept comes to the video age in
Baby Einstein. This 30-minute tape is called a "video board book" and the creators instruct parents of 1- to 18-month-olds to use it that way: huddle around the TV often pointing out objects and interacting with the child as you would with a book. Bright toys, patterns, blocks, and the like move across the screen accompanied by natural sounds, music, and voices. English, Japanese, Russian, German, and other languages are heard telling nursery rhymes or counting to 20. Now the creators don't expect your baby to recite "Humpty Dumpty" in Spanish by the end of the tape, but, as they state in the introduction, hearing different languages invigorates a baby's mind. These educators went on to combine classical music with their program on
Baby Mozart and
Baby Bach.
--Doug Thomas
Special Features
This DVD is more than just a digital version of the video--it incorporates three Baby Einstein Company products in one. From the DVD menu, you can enter the "Home Theater," which plays the award-winning video. Or you can enter the "Concert Hall" to play the music heard in the video or the spoken-language bits (the alphabet, nursery rhymes) in their native tongue. The "Language Lab" features a digital version of Baby Webster, the company's flash-card product for youngsters. These flash cards contain text, pictures, and pronunciations of simple, everyday words in eight languages, including Japanese, Hebrew, Spanish, and English. All programs can automatically repeat for extended play.
--Doug Thomas
