CBeebies, is it just me …

[Helendee]

Or is it becoming horribly dumbed down and turning into Milkshake?
The presenters just shriek and dance around at every opportunity with no sense of rapport with their audience imho. Most of the programmes are now animation with no interaction with the children watching.
I yearn for Sid, Pui and Chris, please come back.
I do like Katy and Rebecca though.

I’ve watched a lot of CBeebies over the years. I have a much younger brother who watched it when it very first started so I remember Chris and Pui as well as Justin Fletcher and the tikkabilla and shiny show days.

I also have my own DC and have a 10 year gap between my eldest and youngest. When my eldest was born I was quite surprised lots of programmes my brother had watched maybe 8/9 years prior were still on so Balamory and Tweenies for example. I even remembered a couple of the episodes! They hadn’t really moved on much although I did love Numberjacks.

Then had a gap where I didn’t have to watch CBeebies for some time until about 18 months ago when my toddler showed some interest. Balamory and Tweenies had gone but they were still showing reruns of programmes I remember being new when my eldest was a toddler such as woolly and tig, again I remembered some of the bloody episodes even though 8 years had elapsed. The presenters had all changed though, the only ones I now remember from the past are Katy who used to do the cooking programme and Rebecca who did the let’s play programme with Sid.

I only really like watching let’s go for a walk because it’s presented by Hamza from countryfile.

It's horses for courses. My kids are not as interested in shows with real people, they both much prefer animation. The Shakespeare stuff and pantos didn't interest them at all although they have been to live theatre and enjoyed it.

The only people I know in real life who are snobby about milkshake are snobby about all sorts of other random things too.

@GoAwayCat
If preferring children to watch good quality, fun informative programmes makes me a snob then that’s great. I am very happy to be labelled so. 🙂

@Hemingwaycat

Ooh is Hamza on Countryfile now?
I must remember! 😊

I don’t mind CBeebies, my dc loves it. I don’t think the programmes are any worse than other children’s tv. Dc is obsessed with Swashbuckle. I must admit I quite enjoy it to, vaguely reminds me of ‘Get Your Own Back’ from when I was a kid. I disagree about the presenters, I think Ben is brilliant.

YABU for liking Numberjacks. Absolutely terrifying broadcasting.

I wish Nigel and Giovanni were full time presenters personally.

Many days spent with Big Barn Farm, Me Too, Brum, Big Cook Little Cook, Balamory, Numberjacks and bedtime was Story Makers and Rubbadubbers! My son is 16 now. Miss those days when he didn’t answer back 🙈

My DD (7) is still obsessed with Cbeebies, she loves Hey Duggee, Topsy and Tim , Molly and Mack, Waffle and Bluey.

She does watch some Cbbc but she finds the programmes there a bit old for her yet (she's only just 7 though).

I like Rebecca, Katy and Evie, not so keen on the others although Ben's ok in small doses.

We love CBEEBIES here! I think the CBeebies Presents series in particular are amazing though my brain can't compute that Robert the Robot = Shakespeare.

The Baby Club was a godsend last year - ftm with newborn in lockdown. Was lovely to be able to join in.

I know they're animation but I really really really rate Alphablocks and Numberblocks for how well they deliver education. Go Jetters has got a bit more into saving the planet now, but is still good and Hey Duggee is just sheer sheer joy - my kids are 8 and 9 now and we still can't walk past a pond with tadpoles in without quoting random lines from Duggee.

I think most of the interactive "filler" pieces were clobbered by Covid, as there's only so much one person can do by themselves, especially if they're less confident working alone or can't sing. There are still some great programmes on there (Let's go for a walk, Yakka Dee, and JoJo have all ben watched by my 3 year old, and she's currently obsessed by Peter Rabbit) but can they please stop scraping the "Andy's random videos of natural history programmes" barrel please? Dinosaur adventures was fine but there must be 4 version of this.

I love Cbeebies. I honestly thought about writing to them to thank them for their existence during lockdown and isolations, it absolutely saved our sanity with a young toddler and trying to wfh. And yes, he's watched way too much TV - but it's reliably good quality, no adverts, nothing too scary or annoying, you can just leave it on and know he's safely entertained.

I love Ben, I think he's lovely. Hamza is brilliant too. Justin creeps me out but my child loves him, goodness knows why. Maddie is great and makes genuinely interesting programmes. I love the random Cbeebies House bits, I always wonder how long they rehearsed them before hitting record... :D I do cringe at the ones who can't sing though, they look so uncomfortable when the others are warbling away.

My 2.5 year old prefers animation (Go Jetters, Peter Rabbit, Bluey, Numberblocks) to real humans, I think the live action stuff goes over his head at the moment. I think winter isolations with endless Alpha/Numberblocks on iPlayer is why he's now way ahead of his age in numbers and letters knowledge.

I really zone out of the content between programmes. I've found it quite interesting how DS really went off it from about 18 months - 2.5. We don't have it on much anyway as he's normally at nursery but it would buy me 15 minutes of a morning or evening and then suddenly he wouldn't watch anything. Now he's just turned three he's really engaged again and tells me what's going on, can name characters etc.

Now I'm on mat leave with DC2 I have it on quite a bit again.

I agree with the Hamza love! He's great.

I don't like the programme with the wooo music which seems to be on most lunchtimes. And as always, there too much Justin.

I was just thinking this the other day when I saw they’re adding ‘Arthur’ which is something from my childhood, definitely not original programming

Can't say I've noticed any difference between when my eldest watched it 15 years ago to my son watching it now. It was always rubbish and irratating.
Keeps them happy for 20 minutes though. Although I do have a rule that Wolly and Tig is never watched because that child annoys me beyond belief.
I prefer Milkshake as my son loves Peppa Pig and Fireman Sam.

Pui was the worst. The absolute worst. So forced.

I loved milkshake as a kid, it was bloody good, so YABU on that score.

One thing I've been shocked/disappointed to discover it's that the hugely irritating Cocomelon which seems to pop up all over YouTube is also now being suggested on CBeebies iPlayer. WTF?

The pedagogy behind both Alpha and Numberblocks is really sound and the voice casting is genius: ‘c’ is Welsh and periodically says ‘see’, ‘d’ is Mancunian as it’s an accent which accentuates the ‘d’ sound.

If preferring children to watch good quality, fun informative programmes makes me a snob then that’s great. I am very happy to be labelled so

But you can get that on Milkshake... In any event kids' TV shouldn't all be worthy and educational in my view, they are supposed to actually enjoy it, but if it helps you to feel superior then crack on.

@GoAwayCat

Yes I will do, cheers!

@Helendee

Or is it becoming horribly dumbed down and turning into Milkshake? The presenters just shriek and dance around at every opportunity with no sense of rapport with their audience imho. Most of the programmes are now animation with no interaction with the children watching. I yearn for Sid, Pui and Chris, please come back. I do like Katy and Rebecca though.

What do you mean by dumbed down though? It's a channel for under 7s and most of the programs will be aimed at under 4s. What sort of things do you think interest a child under 4?

God when the presenter Joanna (I think that’s her name) sings my ears bleed, it’s absolutely horrendous even my 3 year old can’t stand her singing and he has low standards! The others aren’t great singers but are tolerable but Joanna is indescribably bad.
The rest of the programmes are a bit blah, I love show me show me and really miss that.
We absolutely love the CBeebies pantos and the Shakespeare productions, my 3 year old especially loves the new Romeo and Juliette play and understands the story and can actually describe the plot. He also loves Hansel and Gretal and The tale of mr tumble.

Tee and mo is a lovely programme

I disagree. Tee is a very entitled little monkey and I don't want my kids getting ideas about how to behave from him. That episode where, 'Sometimes, Tee just needs a carry.' Well, what if Mo physically can't carry the little monkey? Then what?

I'm not a huge fan of the live action stuff for little kids tbh. I didn't like live action as a kid and didn't want to watch it. Same seems to hold true for my little one. And I get the point of the Shakespeare stuff, all very laudable, but my kiddo won't watch it.