The Numtums


The Numtums is a British computer-animated children's television series created by Barry Quinn for CBeebies. It is about a group of 10 creatures called the Numtums, each with a number on their tummies. The show debuted on CBeebies in the United Kingdom on 27 February 2012, and ended on 15 December 2014 with a total of 3 series.

Plot

The Numtums is about a group of 10 multicolored numbats who live in Gumnut Gorge called the Numtums with numbers on their tummies. The Numtums are based on numbats, hence their fondness for eating termites in their café, the Tasty Termite, and they are named after Australian towns, except Champer. Bizarrely, the environment in which they live appears to be more akin to the Colorado plateau and sonora deserts in the southwest United States than any part of Australia.

Characters

Numtums

The Numtums was animated by Beakus in series 1 and A Productions in series 2 and 3. Series 1 was aimed at toddlers, but series 2 and 3 was revamped for an older audience, introducing more complex concepts such as subtraction, shape recognition and numbers from 11 to 20 with computer animation, and using a more Australian theme. The creator Barry Quinn said in an interview that "we were looking at doing a show about numbers for the early years and an educational expert told us bright, cute characters were a good way to get kids interested." A lot of animal names were suggested but he settled on numbats who had 'num' in their name.

Episodes

Broadcast

The Numtums debuted on CBeebies in the United Kingdom on 27 February 2012 on the channel's Love to Learn block. The series aired on ABC3KIDS in Australia and New Zealand.