Let’s play a game. I’ll give you a word and you say the first thing that comes to mind.
Ready? Here we go.
“Wonderful.”
“Passion.”
“Television.”
“Wishenpoof.”
I’m going to assume that for “wonderful,” you came up with something positive. Perhaps it was a part of your life that you’re particularly happy with or something that you find uplifting. For “passion,” maybe you said something that’s very important to you. For “television,” maybe you mentioned your favorite show or the way that you feel when you’re watching something.
For “Wishenpoof,” you probably said, “Huh?”
Wishenpoof is exactly what it sounds like. It’s whimsical and magical. It’s silly and funny. It’s a talking teddy bear named Bob, who bursts into song and dance for no apparent reason. It’s horses named Pickles who eat pickles. It’s magic wands that look like dandelions and let people ice skate on Saturn’s rings.
Wishenpoof is a new children’s television series available for streaming on Amazon. The main character is Bianca, a young girl who has the power to make her wishes come true. Bianca uses her wishing powers to learn about the world around her. She gets carried away sometimes and has to be reeled in by her mother (who also has magic wishing powers). But then she is able to find the answers to her questions by doing things the “normal” way: reading books and doing online searches to find information. She teaches her friends about the topics so that everyone can learn together.
We were fortunate enough to attend the Wishenpoof premiere party in Central Park. The Amazon folks put out a terrific spread, as you can see:
E drank Shirley Temples, made his own magic wand and played around with the Kindle Fire (Kids Edition) tablets that were there:
We took some turns in the photo booth and ate terrific food:
We also got to watch an episode of the show, which was all about helping kids to find their passions (hence my word choice at the start of this post). Bianca showed that it is possible to be “girly” – a kid who wears a tutu and loves pink and purple – while also being smart and a leader. To be honest, the show was likely a bit old for E; he had some difficulty following the facts about outer space and the mechanism for making a bottle rocket explode. But he definitely understood the concepts of exploring new ground and using magic to learn new things. He loved being at the party and he couldn’t wait to put on the bright blue sparkling wings that he got as we left to go home.
I’ve heard a lot of the debates about how much screen time is appropriate for kids E’s age and I can admit that E probably watches a little too much television from time to time. The thing is, E learns from almost everything he watches. He stopped while he was riding his scooter in Central Park, shaped his hands into binoculars over his eyes, and told T that he wanted to “explore” everywhere because he had watched Wishenpoof that morning. He sings Daniel Tiger’s songs to remember how to handle specific situations. He points to letters and numbers that he sees on Sesame Street and can name the shapes that come up on Odd Squad. T and I are always on the lookout for a new place for E to learn; Wishenpoof may not be the same old typical educational show, but it definitely fits what we want E to be watching.
The full season of Wishenpoof will be available to stream on Amazon on August 14th. I was not compensated financially for this post, but we did receive an Amazon Kindle Fire HD6 Kids Edition when we left the event. The opinions included here are fully my own.
