Monkey Music Let’s Sing and Play
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A couple of weeks ago, a book arrived in the post for the girls. We’re always pleased to receive books to review, as they are both real bookworms. A new story is always welcomed, and the girls will usually read it again and again.
Monkey Music Let’s Sing and Play was a bit different. With the book, you receive a CD that contains 22 songs. The idea is that rather than just listening to a story, children can sing, dance and join in.
Keeping children occupied on a long journey
For us, the book arrived at just the right time – a couple of days before we headed off on holiday to Bluestone Wales, and right in the middle of Libby’s television ban. We had been rather dreading the three hour journey without the luxury of an iPad loaded up with cBeebies to keep them occupied.
Luckily, Monkey Music Let’s Sing and Play was so engaging that both girls were perfectly content looking at the book, listening to the songs, joining in with the singing, doing actions and dancing in their seats. And what’s more, the music is really upbeat and tuneful, and not annoying for us like a children’s nursery rhyme CD would be.
Even the introductory page is nice and bright and engaging, with a list of songs and some tips on how to use the book. The songs in the start with introductory songs – “Monkey Music”, “Hello, hello everyone”, and “I’m getting ready to sing”. The rest of the songs interact with the pages on the book, such as “Where is Monkey Hiding?” and “Sing with Monkey”.
What we loved about the Monkey Music book
My girls particularly enjoyed the “Copy Monkey” page. They sung along and pretended to be the animals. Quacking, jumping (as much as they could in the car) and then moving on to pretend to be a leaf along with the song.
The book and CD are very interactive and are clearly aimed at a situation where you sit together with the child in front of the book and join in, we found it to be the perfect way to pass some time in the car as well.
Since coming home, we have used the more traditional method of sitting together with the book and joining in, and the girls love that too. I really like the idea of a book that is a bit more interactive to keep children’s interest if they’re not easily engaged with a traditional picture book.
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