Chinese for kids DVD

[diva7]

Hi,

I am currently looking for more chinese DVD's for my daughter. I have found this site :
http://www.language-tree.com
-Chinese for Kids. Has anyone purchase these DVD's? Would love to know what your opnions are.

[texaslady22]

I rented them from Netflix once. I really, really wasn't that impressed with them at all. Not very interesting to my child, either. I ended up buying DVDs from China (like the Disney DVDs) that I knew would interest my son more.

[GloriaD]

Very Very bad  ....  go for the wink to Learn chinese !!  great stuff and the owner recently joined the forum so he is one of us now

seriously that product is great as well as Max and Mei series books
www.maxandmei.com  (here is the us you can find them at www.chinasprout.com)


Good luck

gloria

[diva7]

I actually got the whole box set of Wink to learn dvd's. Yes it is fantastic! Atm I am browsing for entertainment chinese DVDs. I previously bought Little Pim which she now loves to watch all the time. 
I purchased all three box set at http://www.childbook.com/SearchResults.asp

texaslady22 many thanks for your review, I am now thinking about introducing her to Dora the explorer in chinese!

Max and Mei series sounds good, not too sure about books as yet. I am illiterate in chinese and currently learning with my daughter. 

Any reviews for Follow Jade learn chinese or Early Start Learn Mandarin chinese?

[wenjonggal]

My son and I love Dora the Explorer in Mandarin... we have all five 5-dvd sets, which come with flashcards. They are simple and formulaic, but not boring, so I learn a lot of vocabulary from them, and also phrasing. If you listen well, when they introduce an English word (they are made for Chinese kids) they often repeat the chinese equivalent several times.

I also really like the Early Start Bao Bei dvds... they have lots of repetition and live action with real kids, and introduce some words and situations that aren't covered by some of the other dvd sets. So many cover the exact same things: colors, hello, same foods and veg, numbers and shapes. The Early Start ones have one about birthday, one about sports etc.

We have the Little Pim 3-dvd set too, which is very nice. Simple and nice that it is ALL mandarin.

My son also loves the two Mei Mei videos we have, though the production quality is kind of sucky. He loves the songs and actions, so we find ourselves singing and playing "Ba luo bo" (pull the carrot/turnip) and "wei wei wei, zhe shi shei" (hello, who is this calling?).

But it is the Dora he watches the most (he is 3).

[diva7]

Hey there wenjonggal,

I have been looking for chinese dvds for my daughter to watch but just dont want to just buy anything. Thanks for your reviews it makes choosing the dvd's much easier. Dora is a good choice but with flashcards its awesome. Just wonder where you got it from?? 

[mtb999]

Thanks wenjonggal!

Where did you purchase the Dora the Explorer DVD sets and flash cards from?

[hypatia]

I went to a language bookshop here in Australia today to look for Mandarin DVDs (based on recommendations from this forum).
There was not much choice (and so expensive), I ended up buying
Early start Bao Bei (nb 2)
I'm quite disapointed with this method as it mixes English & Chinese, which I believe is not the 'right' way to learn a foreign language (You learn your first language by deduction and repetition, not by 'comparing' it). I also wonder the need of learning individual words. I'd rather have my child know a few useful sentence than knowing the colours or the numbers in Chinese.

I'd like to purchase either Little Pim or Wink to Learn, could someone please tell me which method uses sentences, rather than words only.
Thank you!

[Joha]

I rented them from Netflix once. I really, really wasn't that impressed with them at all. Not very interesting to my child, either. I ended up buying DVDs from China (like the Disney DVDs) that I knew would interest my son more.

texasladdy,

This is interesting. I don't have netflix yet, but I was actually going to sign up. Have you rented other educational DVD's from netflix? I was browsing in their website and could not find any. If they do, this would be great so I can see which ones my baby likes before buying them.  Thanks!

[patreiche]

Here is the site to order Dora in Chinese/English.

http://www.asianparent.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=304

[GloriaD]

I purchased this Dora series but the quality of the sound is terrible !!! when I called the company they gave me a long list of reasons why this was bla bla bla quality in short is the cheap version of dvds in china - you will be dissapointed with this purchase to be the low end of china technology it is extremely expensive.

Best programs in my opinion  - sorry but Rosetta Stone for older kids 3 and older, Young learners : wink to Learn, professor toto, and muzzy are good for Mandarin chinese - our humble opinion.

Gloria

[wenjonggal]

oops!
Sorry haven,t been here in a bit!

I have bought the Dora 5-dvd plus flashcards sets from asianparent (as per the link above) as well as from http://bogeji.com which is an ebay store. The Asianparent site has them cheaper, but I am in Canada, and with shipping the asianparent came out more expensive. I have ordered at least 4 times from bogeji.com and have had fast and pleasant service and no excessive shipping charges.

I am sorry to hear that someone got bad audio on their Dora dvds. We have all five sets (five sets of 5 dvds, one set of 6) so that is 26 dvds with two stories on them each, and we only have one dvd that has substandard sound. All the others sound very professional. I have found that the plastic window on the box holding all the dvds comes unglued, but two secs with a gluegun fixed htat. Other than that, the dubbing quality is fantastic, the images clear, and the girl, Nan Nan Jie Jie (big sister Nannan) who introduces the vocabulary and introduces the dvd is fun and engaging. We have had our first Dora dvds for a year now from Bogeji.com and they are going strong and my son hasn't tired of them. We have lent them out to another little girl adopted from China, who is going with her parents to get a new little brother, and she loves them too.

I would also recommend the Pororo dvds from the same site. They are 3D animated short stories for toddlers and preschoolers, starring a little penguin and his bear, fox and cat friends at the north (south?) pole. Very cute, easy to understand. Our chinese teacher said the accent was very good, and the sentences very short and clear. There are subtitles.

Finally, if you already have those,they also have BBC's Little Robot dvds in mandarin. Again, 3D animation for toddlers and preschoolers. They are a bit harder to understand but very fun and the songs and characters are engaging and memorable.

[mtb999]

Thanks wenjonggal for the web site.  The shop sells a 26 DVD Dora pack but without flash cards for US99 - a significant cost saving.  Did you find the flash cards good quality / useful ... ? 

[wenjonggal]

I think the 26 dvd set is in a wooden box, which is very heavy to have shipped to Canada. If you are in the states, go for it!

I do personally like the flash cards. My son plays with them a lot, and they are very solid and nicely made. They DO have all the info on one side however. Ie pinyin, characters, image and english word (and phonetic transcription of the english word which would be more helpful for those learning English than those learning Chinese). And then they have another topic on the reverse side. The cards are about 3.5 inches wide by 4 5/8 inches tall, solid cardboard, with one corner cut off, so it is easy to put them all the same side up. Then they' d have say, occupations on one side of all the cards, and places on the other side of all the cards. So they aren't good for holding up a card and not having the child or yourself see all the info. On the other hand, I quiz myself by showing the top half of the card with the chinese, and then checking the lower (image and english translation).

It is up to you. It definitely is a huge savings to just buy the 26 dvds altogether. I guess I started with just the one set, as I didn't know if they were good. And when I liked them, I already owned 5, so it didn't make sense to then buy the full set. I also like the boxed sets. They are just nice packaging. When I think of it now, that is a silly reason to spend another $100!

Anyways, just to say we love all the stories. They cover so many topics, from Christmas to Easter eggs, colors to birthdays, cowboy Dora to fireman to train to doctor Dora, that it is  joy to learn from them. You get so much vocab from all the different topics, with all the same format "initial problem: ask the map what three places to go to: go to each place one by one: solve the problems (good for learning counting, colors etc): get needed objects from the backpack: solve the problem/arrive at the final destination" which really simplifies understanding the new words and phrases. And all the repetition in English (it is for chinese children to learn English) really aids in understanding the mandarin.

If you think you'd eventually get them all, why not get the full box? ;D

[wenjonggal]

I just got an email from http://bogeji.com that the Dora chinese dvds are on sale, ie 89.99$ instead of 99.99$ for the 26 dvd set. Many dvds in chinese including Berenstein Bears etc are on sale... looks like 10% off.

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