Over the past week, the children and I have been getting our funky wiggle on to the tunes of the Gigglebellies.

I am always on the look out for new and exciting ways to entertain and educate the children…and, if I’m being honest (and as you know, I am nothing if not honest) anything that distracts the children for more than five minutes so I can go to the toilet unaccompanied is a winner in my book. So when I was offered the opportunity to review the Gigglebellies Volume 1 DVD, I was a little bit excited. Not just for the possibility of regaining a little sanity, but because their series is multi-award winning, (including 2012 DVD of the year) and every parent knows that the one thing better than five minutes peace, is five minutes peace guilt-free!

Happily, my daydreams of hot coffee’s and peaceful toilet trips came into fruition thanks to these guys!

Animation Avenue is the Australian and New Zealand exclusive distributor of The GiggleBellies™ Musical Adventures DVD Series from Animation Avenue on Vimeo.

The vibrant colours, upbeat music and lovable characters had the children mesmerized. At first they stared, open-mouthed at the screen.

“This is so cool mum,” Foghorn said grinning.

Bubble didn’t say anything. She was too busy jumping up and down to the beat and clapping her hands. and it was hard to resist joining her.

So I resisted the urge to resist the urge, and bopped around the living room like a crazy woman with the children – a crazy, happy woman, who had recently savoured the delights of a hot coffee and a wee without an audience!

But, of course, there are far more important developmental reasons to enjoy music with your little ones.

Music inspires creativity, self expression and imagination

Research shows that children learn better through music than through almost any other medium.

As children listen to music, they are expanding their minds. They learn to first distinguish sounds and they match music to their moods. As an example, soft and sweet melodies are used to enable sleeping and upbeat music is used to clap and dance to

Even at a very young age, children learn to discriminate between sounds they like and dislike through actions. Naturally, a child will dance along and react more to what they like compared to what they don’t like. This develops critical thinking skills.

Music is the only proven activity that affects whole brain and body development

Music evokes dancing and therefore allows children to physically express themselves

Music is an essential element in your childs learning and development. Exposing your child to both music and movement together will encourage them to dance along and learn balance, coordination, body awareness and rhythm

Music has been shown to assist in the development of speech and memory

Music has a significant impact on a childs health and development

Music promotes reading comprehension and creativity all at the same time

Scientific study is supporting the idea that developing children’s inbuilt musicality appears instrumental in cultivating intelligence, developing language and literacy skills

Music benefits the thinking process, enhances learning and creativity, language development, control and coordination of body movements and social interaction

Music is a way of knowing. According to Harvard psychologist Howard Gardner (1983), music intelligence is equal in importance to logical mathematical intelligence, linguistic intelligence, spatial intelligence, bodily intelligence, interpersonal intelligence, and intrapersonal intelligence. (Excerpt taken from the Animation Avenue website).

Animation Avenue, the Australian and New Zealand exclusive distributor of the Gigglebellies Musical Adventures DVD series, would like to give 3 Mums Lounge members a copy of The Gigglebellies DVD volume 1, so that you too can experience the delights of getting groovy with your preschoolers.

To enter, simply follow the instructions on the rafflecopter widget.

Good luck!

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