Kids Learning Tube: Educational Music Videos
YouTube is a wonderful resource to educate and entertain your kids. Yes, not only at school can they learn about shapes, colours, letters, numbers and then move on to bigger things—and all this in the form of songs! One such channel—Kids Learning Tube—is the subject of this post.
Kids Learning Tube (“KLT”) began in 2015. As of now, it has over 260,000 subscribers, featuring sing-along videos that cover anatomy, animals, geography, grammar, holidays, math, nutrition—even the periodic table (chemistry). All these videos and many others have been viewed millions of times. “The Solar System Song Compilation” alone has 17 million views!
Amazingly, all this is the fruit of one man’s labour. The Kids Learning Tube Guy, as he prefers to be known, grew up in a very musical family. His mother was a professional musician, and music was always around.
The KLT Guy learned how to play when he was a kid, using his mother’s acoustic guitar and listening to Jimi Hendrix note for note on cassette tapes. When he was nine, he traded his brand-new BMX bike for all the Led Zeppelin albums.
Since then, his musical inspirations have varied from Mozart to Rage Against the Machine to James Taylor to Red Hot Chili Peppers to Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young to Radiohead to … the list goes on and on.
Naturally, the KLT Guy began writing music himself and has been the composer for many bands throughout his life. As he’s had nothing but positive feedback from people listening to those bands, he chose to use his abilities and skills to provide the kids — the future of this planet — with some positive influence.
Recently, we had a chance to ask him a few questions about his wonderful project.
BorinsKIDS: When was that very first moment when you realized that you had to start KLT?
KLT: It was after I decided to quit my career to be a stay-at-home father. That was an easy decision. I started searching YouTube for educational material for my son to start learning at his most absorbent age.
But unfortunately, I found nothing but surprise egg and unboxing videos. Or videos that were very basic nursery rhyme style. So I decided to teach myself how to animate while my son took naps, and used my music skills to create songs that weren’t dumbed down, for kids and for parents to learn along with them.
It turns out I made a good decision. Kids all over the world are learning so much. I get hundreds of testimonials from parents monthly, telling me how their kids are teaching them about the human body or space, etc. It’s the best job on earth!
BorinsKIDS: What do you come up with first: lyrics or melody?
KLT: I do one of two things to create a song: (1) I either have an existing melody about a subject I’m passionate about, or (2) I sit down and write a beat followed by the musical orchestration of a song, then add melody to it on a subject picked fresh from my ever-growing request list. I always have melodies in my head.
BorinsKIDS: How many instruments do you play, and how do you go about recording a track?
KLT: I taught myself how to sing and play the keys, guitar, and drums, electronically and real. And I taught myself Logic Pro X, which I use to record.
BorinsKIDS: But where do you find facts/information for your lyrics to cover such an amazing range of subjects? And why do you think your unique approach to learning is so effective?
KLT: On the Internet! I do extensive research on one subject a week. My skill is that I can take the most complex subject and recycle it into a musical lesson. Along with my basic animation style, kids and parents are learning so much. I even have Ivy league students contacting me to let me know my channel is getting the A’s on exams for human anatomy and astronomy! And I think the reason the lessons are sticking is my knack for writing catchy music.
Catchy indeed! As we are polishing this interview, the choir of two is singing “How Do Tornadoes Form?” in front of TV in the living room, with our own feet tapping along happily.
Learn more about KLT by visiting its website at https://www.kidslearningtube.com where you can watch and listen to the tunes, read other parents’ comments, or shop some clothing, bags, posters, and music.
You can also find KLT on YouTube at www.youtube.com/c/kidslearningtube as well as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
And, of course, if you would like to support KLT, you may become a patron and get a few additional perks (like voting for a weekly video or getting the song of the month download) for $1, $5, or $7 a month. For details, visit the following page: https://www.patreon.com/kidslearningtube.
