My wife and 17 month son have a ritual each morning after they awake. My wife gathers my son and brings him into our bedroom where she feeds him his morning bottle while watching Disney’s The Wiggles. I don’t ordinarily encourage an over abundance of television viewing for a boy of his age but The Wiggles offer the most basic of fundamentals for learning and growth. He loves watching them sing and dance and enjoys the variety of colors in the scenery and in the garb of Greg (Yellow), Murray (Red), Jeff (Purple) and Anthony (Blue). Although my son is unaware, he is actually learning about manners, nutrition, safety, how to count, learning animal sounds and his body parts. My wife doesn’t really mind watching this with my son as she finds the show entertaining and knows that there will be nothing bad for him to see.
The Wiggles act out various skits designed to teach children lessons from how to count to encouraging them to eat healthy. They also have individual personalities that can spark the interest of a young child. Murray Wiggle plays guitar, Greg Wiggle performs magic tricks, Anthony is always eating (but healthy) and Jeff tends to nap quite a bit.
In every episode there is a live concert where they are performing one of there songs and they encourage children to get up and dance around so they can have fun and reap the benefits of exercise too. There was one episode where The Wiggles are riding in the Big Red Car and my son starting imitating what they were doing by moving his arm up and down making a toot toot sound.
The Wiggles also teach life lessons in their songs. In addition to singing about colors and numbers, they also sing about the benefits of drinking water and eating fruit salad. They also sing about the benefits of going to the doctor and the dentist.
There are additional characters on the show as well that play a part in the education and entertainment of my son and children alike. There is Dorothy the Dinosaur who dines on red roses and teaches children a new dance step, which in turn helps them with following direction. Captain Feathersword, the friendly pirate, teaches them about adventures to far away places like Italy and England. Henry the Octopus teaches them about life under the sea while Wags the Dogs teaches them how to fetch and do the tango.
The Wiggles formed in 1991. Anthony Field, Murray Cook and Greg Page were studying Early Childhood education in Sydney, Australia and began writing songs as part of a class assignment. They asked Jeff Fatt for assistance as he and Anthony had played together in a band called the Cockroaches back in the 1980’s. The first album they cut has since reached Platinum status but that was merely the beginning. Now in their fifteenth year they have released 27 Videos and DVD’s and a myriad of CD’s world wide.
A large part of their success stems from their background in early education. They have an innate ability to write songs from a child’s perspective and have captured a niche absent from other children’s programs.
To date the Wiggles have released 27 Video/DVD and have been awarded 17 Gold, 12 Platinum, 3 Double Platinum and 10 Multi Platinum Awards for sales of over 17 million DVD and 4 Million CDs worldwide. They have also been awarded the Highest selling Children’s Video sales in 1995, 1996, 1998 and 1999 at the ADSDA Awards. They have also won 3 prestigious APRA song writing awards for the Best Children’s song of 1994, 1995 and 1996 by their peers.
Their top 10 best selling CD are Live Hot Potatoes, Whoo Hoo!Wiggly Gremlins! & Hoop Dee Doo, Wiggly Wiggly Christmas, …Here Comes the Big Red Car, Karaoke Sing Along #1, Wiggle Time, Toot Toot, Yummy Yummy, Wiggly Safari and Go to Sleep Jeff.
In 2005 The Wiggles have opened a multi million dollar amusement park at Dream World on the Gold Coast. They are also going to open another park in Dallas TX. They are also going to be open Wiggly Play Centre in Australia which will be an indoor play center with jumping castles, mazes, theme rooms, ball pits, plasma screens playing Wiggle movies and food from their Yummy Yummy Café.
Thank you for visiting our article: The Wiggles
Monday, February 19, 2007
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