Full Review

23 December 2006 - Having a drum that sounds out the alphabet is one thing, but competitive parents who want to take advantage of their child's brain currently working like a sponge sucking up everything and anything will no doubt want to go for Bilingual LeapStart Learning Table.

Like the Bilingual Drum from LeapFrog the learning table's main aim is to teach your little one basic French and English to music while having fun.

About the size of a small coffee table, it comes with optional legs and provides learning activities including doors, shakers, spinning things, sliders and basically any other touch and feel devices you can think of.

From a learning point of view, the table will offer everything from alphabet to numbers to counting from 1 to 10. Furthermore it will help them recognise colours and opposites, as well as developing motor skills, musical exploration and creativity in both English and French.

If that wasn't enough, there are more than 40 learning songs and 15 musical activities so your little one won't get bored.

VERDICT
In practice and there is so much to play with that Emily our 7-month-old Chief Tester was a little bit overwhelmed by the learning table.

I think because of its size it meant that she could only reach one side of the table at any one time without having to crawl around. Making sure that we'd got the right side to capture her attention did cause us problems.

That said, there is plenty here, meaning this is a toy, if you can cope with the noise (don't worry there are two volume controls - loud and louder) is likely to last.

The optional legs are ideal if your kid isn't yet tall enough to get the height over the top of the table or old enough to support themselves to sit up.

One for older children rather than the 6 month recommendation out of the box. However overall a good experience.