Customer Reviews

Amazing Animals: Animal Families [VHS]

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Our family loves the Amazing Animal series! They are a wonderful way for young children to begin learning about the animals around us. Henry the Lizard is colorful and funny, and is very entertaining for children. It has lots of color, and comedy situations. You learn about many different animal families and how they live. The combination of Animation and real life Video keeps the kids interested over and over again. Our family gives this movie and all Amazing Animal movies a hearty reccomendation.

Will all high quality, entertaining nonfiction for the lower elementary grades please say "here" -

(A few faint "heres" can be heard above the sound of crickets)

Ah, well, heh, I guess there's not exactly scores of books that fall inside those guidelines. With its subtantial facts, nice layout, and outstanding photos, "Animal Families" will be a nice addition to this group. A good pick for libraries and classroom collections.

Human and animal families have a lot in common. We have parents and homes, we eat and have fun. "Animal Families" covers all of these topics in terms young readers can follow. Each two-page spread tackles a different aspect of animal family life. All animals are tossed in together (with a distinct emphasis on mammals), so you'll see koalas, cats, and gorillas all on the same page. Facts are strewn about, with well captioned photos adding visual appeal. Increasing the kid appeal are the intermittent thought balloons that express what various animals are thinking. To quote a baby koala holding on to its mother:

I cling to my mom's back even when she climbs eucalyptus trees to pick leaves for supper.

One of my favorite features are the "filmstrips" that occasionally stretch across the bottom of the spread. Over the course of five small pictures, they give a time-lapse look at animal life. Lion cubs playing, birds being born, and hippos taking baths are all presented in detail.

"Animal Families" will should circulate nicely in schools and libraries that are wise enough to add it to their collections.

Another great and entertaining episode of Henry's Amazing Animals. It is a great and educational video for both young and old. As usual, Henry has to learn a lesson.

And this time, it about family. A entertaining and great show that should be one DVD.

My youtube channel is Elijahpup. Just search animals animal weapons, amazing animals extinct animals and more an you will find my videos.

We recently purchased this video for our 3 year old son. He likes the video, and it does provide some good entertainment value. However, there is definitely room for improvement. We thought this would be a Discovery Channel-type show for young children. Instead, the video spends a lot of its time focusing on the antics of Henry, the animated lizard. Most of the sequences with Henry aren't funny, and his whiny voice quickly began to grate on my nerves. This video tosses in a few short segments showing different animal families, but each of them is very short, and doesn't impart much information. On top of it all, Henry makes wise cracks and complains throughout each scene, which may provide some entertainment to your children, but which also becomes very stale upon repeated viewing.

If you are considering making purchases in this series, I would recommend buying only one video at first. Then, see how you and your kids like it before investing any more. The series definitely holds promise, if only they tone Henry down and make him less of a whiner.

For a nature video, this production sucked, in my opinion. Henry is supposed to be irrepressible and incorrigible, but he's actually annoying and stupid. The structure revolves around interactions between Henry and the narrator, who have some sort of simplistic storyline. Some scenes take place on a white background, which is also peopled by a seemingly random assortment of live-action animals, which wander in and out of the scene without comment. They are interspersed with two types of digressions; first, there is a series of animated shorts featuring cartoon animals which never speak. The second involves more traditional nature documentary footage, which is explained by Henry and the narrator. The character of Henry is spoiled and selfish. In this installment, Henry is bothered by his baby sister, and stressed out when he can't address all of her needs. Meanwhile, he has a birthday party coming up, and is completely focused on receiving presents. This isn't teaching kids anything positive, as far as I'm concerned. The documentary footage is exceedingly brief, rarely focusing on one animal for more than ten seconds, and often flipping through a montage of animals without even naming them, let alone explaining anything about them. The cartoon interludes are somewhat interesting in that the animal characters never speak; they have the feel of a wordless comic strip. But the point of them is questionable, and the educational value is nil. Visually, the video is somewhat interesting, but the mtv-theory of throw lots at the kids to keep their attention has taken over anything of value that this series might offer.