Childminders and children love our Sticky Kids CDs

Our Sticky Kids Fun and Fitness CDs for children are widely used in the UK in nurseries and at home. One keen fan of the CDs, which are aimed at pre-school youngsters, is childminder Helen Wardrop.

Helen is an experienced childminder of more than 20 years and usually cares for three children in her home. She's an energetic childminder who also takes her care and work very seriously.

One of her favourite activities with the children is music and movement – and she loves our Sticky Kids Fun and Fitness CDs.

Recently she took some of the CDs along to one of her local childminding meetings. A group of nine childminders and 26 children get together regularly for social fun and chat.

At the end of one of these sessions, Helen introduced the adults and children to a Sticky Kids fun and fitness session. Here's what happened in Helen's words:

She says: "Our gentle weekly song session turned into chaotic fun! We marched around the room to a song called Ready Steady Go (from Warm Up with the Sticky Kids CD). The children absolutely loved this.

"Of course, the grown ups joined in too but after five or six songs they were exhausted! The children have so much energy!

"Everyone joined in the exercises on the CDs with such enthusiasm and we all laughed so much.

"One of the other childminders made a great point, saying: 'Gosh, you don't have to go to a keep-fit class when you've got this do you?'.

"We've used the CDs a lot since and the children still scream with delight when they hear the introduction to Can You Run as Fast as Me (from Work Out! with the Sticky Kids)".

Helen continues to use the Sticky Kids Fun and Fitness CDs 2 or 3 times per week.

She says: "The CDs are great, with songs to encourage a range of physical skills. They are perfect for early learning goals with a focus on movement, sense of space, health and body awareness.

"But it is not only physical skills that are covered - language skills, listening skills, communication skills and social skills are all there, too.

"The CDs come with 'user notes', which are very helpful for suggesting what actions to do with the songs. Just choose the songs you need and press play."

* There are now more than 10,000 pre-school groups (including childminders) throughout the UK using Sticky Kids Fun and Fitness CDs. Have you tried one yet?

Childminders give Sticky Kids CDs the thumbs up

We're finding that more and more childminders are buying our Sticky Kids CDs for use in the home with the children that they care for. They tell me that the CDs are ideal for a fun fitness session and that all the children love the action songs and games.

I am delighted by this news. It was actually during my time as a childminder that my husband Steve and I first started recording the Sticky Kids CDs. I found the CDs were very useful for me in my work - and it was then that I had an inkling that the fun and fitness CDs would be a hit with school, parents, childminders and children across the UK. This has been shown to be the case!

Added to all this I've now been asked to speak at a childminders conference in Birmingham next year about all the benefits of our CDs. If you attend you'll receive one of our free sample CDs in your delegate bag. We'll keep you posted about the event nearer the time.

So thank you to all our Sticky Kids child-minding fans. We really appreciate your support.

Win a Sticky Kids CD

Are you looking for fun ideas for your youngsters this summer? As the long holidays start most parents will be keen to keep their kids fit, active and occupied. So why not check out our great range of Sticky Kids CDS?

Better still you could be in with a chance of winning one of three Three Cheers CDs that we are giving away. The Three Cheers CD is a great collection of eight lively songs from across the Sticky Kids range. There's a special label on the reverse side so that you can personalise your CD.

Perhaps you and your child are already familiar with Sticky Kids through pre-school care and education. Sticky Kids CDs are designed to cover the key elements of the curriculum for under-sevens – from counting and the alphabet, to our world, music and movement. The Sticky Kids songs are lively and catchy – and promote fitness and health in a fun way.

The Sticky Kids CDs are also ideal for fun and active games in the home. Whether you are looking for an energetic movement session or simply to listen to rhymes and music with your kids there's a CD that will suit you. Sticky Kids have also created a CD called In The Car with a mix of funky tunes and short stories with car journeys in mind. Perhaps there'll be less "are we there yets"!

Because many of the songs are specially written by the Sticky Kids team, you can enjoy learning new songs alongside some more traditional favourites (but always with a Sticky Kids twist). Each CD comes with suggestions for the actions and notes on how to get the most out of the CD.

Competition time

To win one of three Three Cheers CDs you simply need to be the first to correctly answer the following question:

What are the names of the two main characters in the Sticky Kids Summer Singalong Tour? (Clue: check out the Sticky Kids website.)

To enter simply Tweet your answer to @stickykids or reply in a comment to this blog. We can then Direct Message each other or use email to find out your address so that we can send out your prize.

The rules are straightforward: the first three tweeters/commenter to give the correct answer win a Three Cheers CD. This blog editor's decision is final.

Fun and singing on the Sticky Kids Summer Singalong Tour

Wow, this summer is busy for the Sticky Kids team. But it's also a great deal of fun. The Sticky Kids Summer Special tour, with Molly Muddle and Old MacDonald, offers an action-packed singalong show for 2-6-year-olds. The action songs are all favourites from our popular range of CDs, such as The Beach Ball Song, Wheels on the Bus and Let’s Go Driving.

There's lots of audience participation, which the kids love! If you like things live and fun-filled then this is for you.

Lots of fun at Perth Concert Hall

Molly Muddle and Old MacDonald had a great time at the Perth Concert Hall last month. The audience loved our Sticky Kids Singalong Show and they enthusiastically joined in all the songs.

It was wonderful to hear the children singing to all their favourite songs – and it was so lovely to see their faces light up when we invited some of the children to join us on the stage.

We have to thank the Perth Concert Hall for looking after us so well.The changing rooms were really something else. So often at other venues we get changed in cleaning cupboards or similar (we don't mind really). But at Perth Concert Hall we were treated to proper changing facilities resplendent with fluffy white towels, leather couches and ensuite showers. Ooh the decadence of it all!

Perth Concert Hall have already asked us back next summer, this time to do two performances, as well as the year after! We can't believe we have booking two years in advance - it's so exciting. In 2012 we will be performing Ready Steady Sing, which celebrates our Olympic CD coming out next January, to tie in with the London Olympics year, and which will be full of brand-new Action Songs.

Choir sing on Go For Gold CD

Talking of which, the children's choir were in recording this week for our new Sticky Kids Go For Gold CD. We told you about this exciting new fun and fitness CD in last week's blog.

Our Sticky Kids Singalong Show line-up

* Molly Muddle and Old MacDonald were also in Dumfries in the Scottish Border recently. The Sticky Kids Singalong Show sold more than 500 tickets. It's be great to meet the grown-ups and kids at our fun show.

* We were also in Moffat performing at the town's brand new school.

* Then we'll be touring England with our summer show. Just last week we played a lovely little theatre in Whitehaven called Rosehill. Because we sold so many tickets for the morning show, we decided to do an afternoon performance as well.

* The following day we performed at Stockton for the first time - and then we returned to one of our favourite venues, the Ace Centre in Nelson.

If you want to find out more about our popular Sticky Kids Singalong Show then please see our website. You'll also find a selection of CDs that you can enjoy at home including the Sticky Kids Show CD.