Make your house a play house everyday! (Disney Channel)

Member Name: English Lady

Product:	Disney Channel
Date:	14/08/03 (5594 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: engaging, entertaining, educational

Disadvantages: repetitive!

I was introduced to Playhouse Disney about 2 years ago now. Surprisingly however it wasn?t the birth of my little bundle of joy that helped me discover it. It was in fact my younger sister who is soon approaching her twenty- first birthday!


She watched it primarily for Bear in the big blue house and when we were over at my mums visiting Sarah would leave Playhouse Disney on for Bethanny. Mind you Bethanny would be asleep and Aunty Sarah would still be watching Bear!


When we got cable TV we took the full package which included all the Disney channels. If you have a package with all the movie channels you get all the Disney channels for free, otherwise you can add them at a monthly fee. With NTL that fee is £5.
Playhouse Disney is aimed at Pre-school children, though I think that it would be suitable for children up to around 6 or 7 years of age.

Between the actual programmes Big Dave(who always wears a blue shirt and red trousers) and little Alex (who wears a pink t-shirt with an orange flower on it and blue trousers) talk directly to whoever is watching, they also sing songs, make craft items, play pretend games etc. Pretty bog standard children?s TV presenter stuff!

The viewing on Playhouse Disney is split into ?days? I think there are about 3 or 4 of these in every real day. Each one has a theme like poorly day, work day, shape day, number day, travelling day and many more. The programmes tend to follow this theme however loosely!
Playhouse Disney runs from around 7am right up until about 10pm,so almost any time of day when you need a break Big Dave and Little Alex are ready to take over!

The ?days? are set in a big brightly coloured house, the presenters use all the different rooms to introduce different programmes.

Uncle Charlie and Aunty Rosie (two pictures that move and talk) reside in the attic and they go through children's birthday cards and pictures.

Dav
e and Alex don?t know that Charlie and Rosie move and this great secret is wonderful for children who always like to know they?ve got one up on the adults!


The great thing about Playhouse Disney is the sheer variety in programmes. Here are a few of Bethannys favourites.


Bear in the big blue house.

Bear is one of my favourites too! A big friendly orange bear lives in a big blue house(I bet that surprised you!) and has lots of young friends like Tutter the blue mouse, Ojo the little bear and Treelo the brightly coloured lemur. They all have many adventures and learn all about the world. There are some great jokes for the adults to keep us entertained too.


Art Play


A couple of presenters do this programme but usually it is the blonde haired and bubbly Sara-Louise. She makes lots of different Disney related craft projects like a Simba the lion mask, Winnie the Poohs honey pot, Cinderella?s castle and many others. This is aimed at older children I think but the other children helpers that are on this programme fascinate my little girl.



Stanley

I love Stanley! It is a cartoon about a young boy who loves animals! He has a pet goldfish and a cat and dog as well and they go on many animal associated adventures using ?the great big book of everything?


Circle Time


?That reminds me of a story!?

Jason presents this story based programme, it drives me bonkers but again Beth is fascinated by the children who sit round and listen to Jason?s story, each one has a moral behind it.


64 Zoo Lane

This is a cartoon about a little girl who lives next to a Zoo. Every night she slides down the giraffe?s neck and goes and plays with the animals in the Zoo. They tell lots of stories from when they were in the wild! A very cute programme!


Out of the box.

This programme drives me batty, it?s very sugary swe
et and quintessentially American. Tony and Vivian have a play house in their garden, made out of boxes(hence the name) and each day different local kids come into the box and sing and dance and put on shows as well as making crafts and dressing up.

I like this programme idea, I just don?t like the way it is so fake, the children obviously have lines and it is all a little too manufactured for my liking. However Beth loves it and will often sit through a whole episode completely enthralled.

Bite Size

Is a cookery programme with Mitzy (an oven glove puppet) and one of several ?chef?s? usually however it is Big Dave. They create a variety of child friendly dishes, savoury and sweet and teach about the importance of hygiene in the kitchen. There is lots of singing and dancing and humour. It is an interesting programme to watch and I think I will create some of the ideas when Beth is a bit older and will appreciate them more!

Classic ?Toon


This basically is a good old-fashioned Disney cartoon, often with Donald duck or goofy as the star.


There are other programmes like Sing me a story with Belle (loosely based around the Beauty and the Beast character, Jasper (a cartoon penguin) and Paws but we very rarely watch these.

Playhouse Disney is Entertaining, educational and not too mined numbingly boring if you?re an adult having to watch it! The same format is used over and over again because children love routine but it can get a bit tiring after the 100th time of listening or watching!

Of course playhouse Disney have a website:


www.playhousedisney.co.uk


It isn?t that brilliant, it gives some info about each programme and there are online games to play and craft ideas and an art gallery of children?s art but really there isn?t a lot on it and it?s not particularly child friendly in my mind. It is worth a look but I don?t think it would be a site you?d be b
ook marking!


Bethanny Gives Playhouse Disney 4 stars, purely because there aren?t enough episodes of Bear in the Big Blue House shown and that they showed her birthday card a week late! However she was impressed because they got Bear in to read it out for her!


I agree with her 4 star assessment, I?d give them another one if they got rid of some of the annoying programmes and made their website a bit more exciting!

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