I am participating once again in latinaish.com‘s Spanish Friday. Join us! Leí una vez un artículo de Anna Quindlen donde decía que el día más feliz de su vida fue cuando se dió cuenta de que su hijo podía leer. Me identifico complétamente con este sentimiento, porque cuando mis propios hijos aprendieron a leer sabía que les iba a traer un mundo de alegría. Los libros siempre me han acompañado, en las buenas y en [...]
Butiá is a website created by the record label Papagayo Azul to promote children’s music in Uruguay, Latin American and the Caribbean. The site has a tremendous variety of quality children’s music in Spanish and Portuguese. You can read about the artists (in Spanish), listen to music and buy albums or individual songs. I love Butiá because I can buy music I cannot get in the United States. I live in a small city in [...]
Talk about this photograph of taxis in Mexico City to help your child learn Spanish. The questions that follow, like all the Learn Spanish with Pictures activities, are ordered to help children master the vocabulary and gain confidence with the language. Start with Describe the photo (1), and be sure to point to the objects in the picture as you talk about them. Use gestures, facial expressions and actions to help your child understand what [...]
Todos los patitos is a children’s song in Spanish that tells the story of a family of ducks that goes swimming. As with all traditional songs, there are many variations. In some versions, the verb for to swim is nadar and in others it is bañar. Both are common equivalents for to swim. In the traditional lyrics the mother duck gets angry and tries to spank one of the ducklings, but that has been changed [...]
I am participating once again in http://latinaish.com/ ‘s Spanish Friday. Join us! Hace unas semanas un grupo de amigos hablábamos del poder de los medios de comunicación. Nos preguntábamos qué seríamos capaces de hacer si esos medios tan poderosos intentaran influir a la gente de manera positiva. De allí empezamos a hablar de las campañas de valores que se han hecho, y un amigo mencionó ¿Tienes el valor o te vale? Son comerciales que trasmite [...]
9letras is the blog of Alberto Abarca Fillat of Huesca, Spain. Alberto shares educational material for teaching Spanish and the website has an impressive number of printable activities for young Spanish language learners. All of the material is created by the author, and lots of the activities have pictures to help Spanish learners interpret the language. Many of these activities with pictures are designed for beginning readers. They also work well with children who do [...]
At the end of my last post, I mentioned a video of a clapping game with cups called Escatumbararibê. The game is from Brazil and the song has nonsense words. The video I recommended is a version of Escatumbararibê combined with a traditional juego de manos, a clapping game, called Los hermanos de Juan. A reader requested the lyrics to the song in the video, so here they are. ¡A jugar! Zum zum zum Escatumbararibê [...]
My students really like clapping patterns with Spanish words. I keep it simple by using a combination of beats on the table and clapping. We all do the rhythm and say the words in unison. For example, the most simple rhythm we do is to these words: Sí, sí No, no No sé. I use this simple pattern: 1. Sí, sí – Two beats on the table – palms down, both hands at the same [...]
This catchy song and video teach the Spanish numbers 1-10. The video shows the numbers as kids hear and sing them, so they are associating the words with the written numerals. Singing is also great Spanish pronunciation practice. This song is mostly numbers, but I like it because there is other language too. The numbers are incorporated into normal Spanish structures with a few useful words. Kids will learn that empieza means start, and that meaning [...]
The games on Jugarjuntos.com are designed for native Spanish speakers, but they work well with young Spanish language learners too. There are a variety of games with audio to teach basic concepts. These games teach Spanish language learners vocabulary and also model correct pronunciation. Online game with audio teaches prepositions in Spanish This game has a picture with a dog house and a tree. Children hear a location in Spanish and move the dog to [...]
Storybird is such an amazing resource that it is hard to know where to begin to write about it. It is a collaborative storytelling site, designed to let children, or anyone, write art-inspired stories. The tremendous variety and excellent quality of the art make Storybird a wonderful tool for teaching and learning Spanish or any language. There are endless ways that the beautiful illustrations on this site can be used as a teaching tool. For [...]
Let’s Eat! / ¡A comer! is a picture book in Spanish and English by Pat Mora. This story fits into any number of my classes. It has family vocabulary, food vocabulary, simple structures, a strong cultural component, and detailed pictures that can be used for all kinds of conversation about home and family. The story line of Let’s Eat! / ¡A comer! is straightforward. A family comes to the table, and there is plenty of [...]