Our Little Treasure
Activities, Recipes, Shopping and more for people caring for young children

Treasure Road Tests - May 2008

The Team at Our Little Treasure try new products on the market and give you our honest opinion on what is a great buy for your family.

Would you like to become one of Our Little Treasure's Road Testers? Let us know by clicking here.


Treasure Road Test - BabyBlinks

Australian parents have designed the BabyBlinks development series as a creative introduction to learning for babies and toddlers.
BabyBlinks encourages active learning by incorporating images and music that capture a young child's attention and imagination, while inspiring their curiosity and development.
BabyBlinks is proudly researched, written, produced, owned and made in Australia. Loaded with local, Australian references and narration.
BabyBlinks does not claim to make your baby smarter. Children absorb and learn an amazing amount in their early years. It is important that they are given age appropriate tools to encourage their development. BabyBlinks is designed to be one of many available educational tools that will provide a strong foundation for future learning and development.
BabyBlinks encourages positive interaction. We recommend parents view it with their children, treating it like an interactive picture book, pointing things out and asking questions along the way.

Our panel of new and experienced mums test drove BabyBlinks DVDs, and this is what they had to say:

  • Fantastic DVD. The bright and colourful images caught my two daughters attention (in particular, the 2 year old was mesmerised!). The DVD showed the alphabet and items starting with each letter and went through parts of the body and emotions. The letters and words were repeated and copied by my daughter - it seemed to be a great learning tool. The DVD also contained two music tracks - both were enjoyed by the kids and were great to dance to!! N. Osborne, mum to 2.
  • I would recommend this DVD as an educational learning tool. It's Australian based, it has Aussie music, talking and animals, FANTASTIC and about time we recognised our great country, this is a rare quality in learning DVDs. My son (10 months) after two weeks of watching now points to his nose and can recognise a lot of the Australian animals especially the lorikeets as we have these in our tree at the moment. The only con is the toy displaying is a little over the top. I like the different way the DVD is presented, but I tend to think there is too much displaying of toys almost like advertising and I have noticed this is also when my son stops watching. A. Noli, mum to 1.
  • BabyBlinks Marvellous Moments - My 15 month old would sit down and watch a fair bit until she wandered off, but not being far away, she was often drawn back to the TV by the bright eye catching visuals. I felt it was perfect to teach her parts of the body and was certainly a good start on learning the alphabet. My Four year old also loved it, she wants to watch it twice! Repeating the alphabet with the DVD. Asking about the Australian Wildlife, and loves watching the other children, it kept her entertained. From a parents perspective, I loved the music, it was soothing and calming great to put on in the mad hour in the evening to keep every one calm without the normal loud noise of other kids DVDs. I could certainly see the benefits of having a DVD from birth, it would definitely catch a younger babies eye as well. I think $20 would be a fairer price, but then EVERYTHING is more expensive these days so I guess $25 is pretty fair. Overall I would recommend the DVD to other parents, it's one I know will be in my DVD player on a regular basis. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to do this Our Little Treasure's road test and having a great DVD for my girls to watch again and again. S. Hutchinson, mum to 2.
  • From a parents point of view, I think it is fantastic. I loved all the Australian animals and the animation was beautiful. The bright colours and the sounds, the music and the animal sounds, kept drawing our babies' attentions back to the television. I thought it was excellent how the alphabet was done a couple of different ways - just the alphabet and then the alphabet and saying a word that the letter starts with. Whilst it is a fun DVD I found it to be very educational too. In regards to the price, I went onto the Baby Blinks website to get this information - $24.95 plus $5 postage and handling. Based on this, I would not purchase these DVDs. I think $30 is way too expensive for a kids DVD. J. Tyrrell, mum to 4.
  • I liked the concept of the video and the touch for including Australian animals. Due to my son's age it did not keep his attention however when he was focused he had a lot of fun dancing around to the music and copying the actions of the other children. My daughter surprisingly for her age was very interested in the DVD and has requested on numerous times if she could watch it. For this age group I would have liked to have seen some counting learning sections to compliment the alphabet sections.  I do feel that this DVD is over priced. If it came in at just under $20 I think that it may be a more appealing price range. One major con that I found with this DVD is that the sound level was not consistent. In some parts the sound (even when there was a narrator) seemed to fade in and out, being too loud in some areas. I feel that this problem affects the quality and price range for which you would expect to pay. M. Bird, mum to 2.
  • We received the Marvellous Moments video and I have to say that I was very impressed. From a parent's perspective I love that my children are watching something with so much Australian content. I love the fact that they are not listening to another American who can't even say 'Z' properly. The visuals are simple yet very engaging. My daughter gets excited every time the balls or the sparkle mobiles are on. The body recognition is fantastic whilst the alphabet repetition is great for the older ages. The only negative I would say is that my 17month old does not like the turtle or the snake. Every time that part comes on she turns away and will only resume viewing once she knows they are finished. Pricing I would consider quite appropriate. I do intend purchasing another myself and feel that I will get value for money based on what I have seen so far. Overall I would rate the videos quite highly. From a parents perspective a great chance to sit and interact with my daughter. From a professional child care workers point of view the video contains a lot of good developmental opportunities. Thank you for the opportunity to have been part of this trial. J. Norton, mum to 2.
  • We have had the Baby Blinks DVD for two weeks now and it has been played in our house at least twice daily. Amelia is 13 months and was interested in the DVD from the start. This was evidenced by her glancing up at the TV while playing with her toys and also "bopping" and swaying to the music. Now, two weeks later, when the DVD starts she smiles, claps and gets very excited! Her attention is held throughout most of the DVD. She is particularly interested in the children playing and smiling and during the "Learning Body Parts" sections she actively participates which, as a mother, is awesome to watch! From a parent's perspective the music is great! It is actually relaxing. The themes are repetitious which assists learning. Overall, the DVD is not obtrusive and busy like so many other children's DVDs are. It is calm, simple, educational and fun. A. Fulton, mum to 1.
  • My son who is 13 and a half months, wasn't that enthusiastic about the DVD, he kept walking off to find his books to read, he did enjoy the music that was played on the DVD. My almost 3 year old daughter absolutely loved the DVD, especially the pointing to the body parts and the alphabet and all the Australian animals. I think the DVD is great but maybe for a slightly older age group than 6- 15 months. M. Sango, mum to 2.
  • Yes, I would recommend, however perhaps more suited to start viewing it for a younger baby – between 6 to 9 months. And then I feel I will get use out of it when my daughter is around 18 months (she is currently 15 months) with the alphabet part. The DVDs were very colourful, bright and interactive. Lots of variety presented. The combination of real humans (babies/children) and animals is excellent. The Australian accent was great (although I think a Kiwi accent was slipped in there somewhere!). Every time a baby came on the screen, my daughter would go up to the TV and talk to it or try and touch it. My daughter also tried to repeat most of the words that were said. I also tried it in the background as she was playing and little things kept catching her attention which was great as she isn’t a huge TV fan. Sometimes it was hard to hear the talking/words over the background music – perhaps the music was a bit loud on the DVD. The other thing I found with my DVD is that the music went from loud to soft throughout the whole thing so I had to keep playing with the volume. If this is on all DVDs, it does need to be addressed urgently. I think the emotions part was probably better suited to a 2 year plus child – a little too sophisticated for a baby – my daughter lost a little bit of interest in this part. A Stratiotis, mum to 1.
  • Thanks for the opportunity to road test Baby Blinks Marvellous Moments. My initial reaction was that I was watching another "Brainy Baby" DVD but I was soon pleasantly surprised to seen gorgeous Australian native animals in their natural habitat interspersed with the vibrant & stimulating animations, children and toys. The major drawcard is the Australian narration, especially the alphabet pronunciation. It is definitely a winner in my opinion. The body parts segment was a major hit with my 15month old, who has just recently mastered all body parts and it was lovely to watch her interact with the children on the screen. The emotions segment was also good as I rate emotional intelligence high and can see this assisting in my daughter's learning experience in the months to come. The inclusion of two distinctly different works of music was great for variety and stimulation, as was the ability to isolate the educational segments of alphabet, body & emotions. Overall the images & music managed to capture my 15 month olds attention for a significant amount of time and she enjoyed walking over to the screen and pointing at the animals and interacting with the children. The price is very reasonable for the excellent content and also in comparison with similar DVD's. I would definitely recommend Baby Blinks to other parents. L. Cunningham, mum to 2.
  • We absolutely loved the DVD. As an Aussie mum I loved the attention paid to our Aussie animals, I also appreciated the repletion of all the key concepts (alphabet etc). My 19 month old loved it and was quickly singing along with the DVD. I also played it for my nephew 9months and he loved it clapping along riveted to the bright and colourful images. My 30 month old nephew also enjoyed the music and loudly called out the items as they popped onto the screen. All the children loved watching and mimicking the children throughout the DVD. The pricing is higher then other similar (more well known – ie ABC Kids DVD’s) products. This DVD would make an excellent edition to any parent/child’s DVD collection. Great Product well done. A. Bruce, mum to 1.

For more information about BabyBlinks or to locate a stockist visit the BabyBlinks website at www.babyblinks.com.

Recommend to a friend  |  Add OLT to Favourites  |  Digg this page  |  Add to del.icio.us  |  Add to reddit  |  Facebook