In Spanish, this game is a comecocos or a sacapiojos. In English, it is called a cootie-catcher, a chatterbox or a fortune teller. This is an excellent language activity and it can be adapted in lots of different ways to use with Spanish language learners. It involves folding paper to make a toy that fits over your fingers and opens and closes. A friend chooses a series of pictures or words to arrive at the answer to a question. Comecocos is also the Spanish name for the 80s video game Pac-man, so if you want to search for this paper game, search comecocos de papel.

If you are not familiar with this game, you can get an idea of how it works from this video: Spanish game

Traditionally, a comecocos is a kind of fortune-teller, with the final answer being a prediction. For Spanish language learners, you can make the comecocos so kids arrive at a question to answer, an action to do, an adjective that describes them, their favorite food, or other vocabulary that you want to practice.

When I use a comecocos with Spanish language learners, instead of having kids spell words, I have them say the words in syllables and usually as part of a phrase. For example, if the first choice is of a color, and the friend chooses rojo, the child with the comecocos opens and closes it twice, as she says aloud ro-jo, or for each syllable as she says the phrase El color es rojo. Kids like the phrases because they get to open and close the comecocos more. You can use phrases like El número es… and El animal es…, depending on the comecocos.

With any comecocos, you will want to be sure the player with the toy knows how to ask the other player which color,  number or animal she chooses. Teach the question ¿Cuál quieres? or ¿Cuál escojes? if the kids do not know it. They can also say Escoje uno (Choose one.).

Printable Spanish game – Comecocos

Here are a few of my comecocos to print and use with Spanish language learners. You can easily make your own by writing in words, adding drawings and using stickers. I have included a blank comecocos. There are instructions for folding these below the PDFs, but you can also just fold them without a pattern. Links to useful sites with more instructions and ideas follow my materials.

Spanish game – Los animales: A comecocos with numbers and animals. The final choice reveals a question about what sound an animal makes: ¿Cómo hace un perro?  This is a simple way for kids to practice animal vocabulary.

Spanish game – Preguntas: A comecocos with colors and numbers. The final choice reveals a personal information question to answer, such as ¿Cuántos hermanos tienes?

Spanish game – ¿Cómo eres?: A comecocos with colors and numbers. The final choice reveals an adjective that describes the player such as paciente, fuerte, amable.

Spanish game – La Navidad: A comecocos with Christmas vocabulary and numbers. The final choice reveals a picture of what the player will get for Christmas.

A blank comecocos. Write or draw whatever you like. Stickers work well too.

Printable instructions for the Spanish game, comecocos.

Instructions for folding the Spanish game – Comecocos

1. Cut out the comecocos.

2. With the printed side up, fold in half to get a rectangle. Fold that rectangle in half to get a square.

3. Open the comecocos completely, place the printed side down on the table, and fold each corner into the center (the point of the corner will touch the middle). You will have a square.

4. Flip over the comecocos (the corners you just folded in will be against the table). Again fold in each corner so the point touches the center.

5. Flip over again and fold in half to crease, unfold and then fold in half the other way to crease. Unfold. You should end up with a square with little pockets at each corner.

6. Fold in half with the pockets on the outside. Hold the comecocos so the openings of the pockets are down. Put the thumb and index finger from one hand into the pockets on one side. Put the other thumb and index finger into the other two pockets. Pinch your index fingers and thumbs together.

Useful links for using this Spanish game:

- Instructions for folding a comecocos.

- Another set of instructions to make this Spanish game.

- Another set of instructions from PBS.

- An online form for making your own Spanish folded paper game. The outside squares are characters from the PBS show Arthur, but they are each associated with a color. The second level has numbers. You type in the final phrases. You may have to write in accent marks. I couldn’t get them to work on my Mac.

- Spanish instructions for making this game.

- A pretty printable Spanish comecocos with the planets on the inside. There is information (in Spanish) about how the students use this Spanish game to choose which planet to study.

- Instructions and additional game ideas. There are a few printable patterns, one with only shapes and colors that would work in Spanish.

- Spanish video showing how to fold this game. There are lots of videos in English on YouTube if you search “cootie-catcher”.

This extensive set of free printable materials has lots of wonderful activities for Spanish language learners. It is offered by Udicom on the educational portal Educarm of the Department of Education in Murcia, Spain.

These printable PDFs are designed for native Spanish speakers with a focus on language in context. The set includes a variety of activities that can be used with Spanish language learners at different levels. These materials are divided into 11 units. Each unit is divided into 6 sections with many different activities. Each unit also includes sets of activities for several letters.

The first section in each unit, Bloque 1, begins with a vocabulary list and picture cards with the image, the word in print and the word in cursive. These are followed by vocabulary exercises like crossing out the picture that does not belong, cutting and pasting into categories and ordering a series of pictures.

All the sections in a unit have exercises for beginning readers like matching the picture to the word, categorizing, completing the word, ordering syllables, and puzzles like crosswords and wordsearches. In addition, there is practice with basic grammar points like gender and articles (el or la) and forming plurals. There are also activities with basic concepts like shapes, colors, and size.

The exercises are from Spain, so some of the words, nouns in particular, differ from what is used in Latin America. However, the vast majority of the vocabulary is standard. There is a lot of material in these units and much of it will be useful to teachers and parents working with Spanish language learners.

These materials are offered free of charge for educational purposes. You can accept the terms of use here and you will be taken to the index of Printable Spanish Activities.

You can go directly to the index to look over the activities, but do go back and accept the terms of use (to not modify the work and leave the copyright intact) if you find materials  you can use.

These are the 11 units:

1. El colegio y mi aula.  - School and my classroom
2. El cuerpo y los sentidos. – The body and the senses
3. Los alimentos. – Food
4. Las prendas de vestir. – Clothing
5. La casa. – The house
6. La calle. – The street
7. Los oficios. – Jobs
8. Los animales. – Animals
9. Las plantas. – Plants
10. Los medios de transporte. – Transportation
11. Los medios de comunicación. – Communication

Let’s Learn to Speak Spanish: Conversational Workbook and CD is a set of worksheets and activities by Susana Murphy, published by the non-profit One World Foundation. Susana sent me a copy of this book because she realized it would be helpful to many Spanish Playground readers. These activities are an excellent supplement to an elementary Spanish program. The book is also a great choice for parents who want to reinforce a school program or introduce their child to Spanish at home. The exercises cover the most common introductory topics and the pages can be photocopied. It takes tons of material to give kids enough exposure to these basics. This workbook gives teachers and parents an easy way to reinforce what kids are learning.

Most of these Spanish activities are based on translation and there is a glossary in the back of the book. This format makes the book is a good choice for parents who do not have much knowledge of Spanish but want to introduce school-age children to Spanish at home. The workbook comes with an audio CD of native speakers from Costa Rica, Colombia and the Dominican Republic. With this support, parents and kids can hear the correct pronunciation and practice the sounds of Spanish. These are written activities, but I really like how consistently this book reminds kids to use the spoken language. They need lots encouragement to speak Spanish!

Let’s Learn to Speak Spanish includes activities on topics like the alphabet, greetings, numbers, the days of the week, the months of the year, and the weather. There are also worksheets for units like colors, food, animals, clothing, body parts and places. The grammar practice is basic and appropriate for many elementary programs and even middle school programs. In addition to the singular forms of regular -ar verbs in the present, the book has exercises on ir, tener, querer and gustar.

For each of the topics covered, there are several different Spanish activities. You will find word searches, scrambled words, and pictures to color. Kids will choose which word does not belong, match words to pictures, copy Spanish sentences and complete sentences by filling in the blank. The book includes flash cards of common phrases and vocabulary and also mini-books to practice the verbs quiero, voy and tengo. All of the worksheets provide sufficient practice, but are not so long that they become boring.  Also, I love the choice of vocabulary in this book. It is truly representative of a standard Spanish that will be understood worldwide.

Many of these topics include a section called ¿Sabes? on one of the worksheets. These sections are a wonderful collection of cultural and linguistic information. The explanations are short with clear examples and include all kinds of fun, useful and very accurate information.

There is no doubt that this book will save teachers time and provide students with an opportunity to practice the basics. I think that Let’s Learn to Speak Spanish is also a great model of the kinds of Spanish activities that teachers can make. For parents who want to introduce kids to Spanish at home or reinforce a school program, there are a variety of activities that will keep kids entertained while giving them some of the essential practice that it takes to learn Spanish.

Disclosure: The company sent me a copy of the book to write this article. All of the ideas and opinions are my own.

I have been having a great time with the Whistlefritz CD, Cha, Cha, Cha -Spanish Learning Songs. This award-winning collection of songs for children has a combination of original works and traditional music in Spanish. Visit the website to learn more about the Whistlefritz Spanish CDs and Spanish DVDs for kids.

The CD Cha, Cha, Cha is designed for children learning Spanish, but this is music that native speakers will enjoy just as much. The original songs teach basic concepts like the vowels, the days of the week, the months, and the seasons. Jorge Anaya’s arrangements of the traditional songs are so well done that they feel “right” to native speakers. This is excellent music for learning Spanish, but it is also just excellent music.

The original songs will teach Spanish vocabulary, verbs, and pronunciation to children learning Spanish. These songs are carefully designed language-learning tools. Many can be combined with actions, and they all create a context that gives the language meaning. I will mention a few of my favorites to give you an idea of how carefully crafted this music is.

Las estaciones (The Seasons) is about the weather in each season and the clothes children put on to go out to play. The weather vocabulary reinforces the meaning of the clothes words and vice versa. The language – season, weather, clothes – comes together to make a logical whole so that kids understand and remember it. This song can easily be combined with actions – one of the best ways for kids to learn Spanish. Like lots of the songs on this CD, it is very visual. It would be a great song for kids to illustrate. I also love the message of this song – that you can always be outside. No matter the weather, you dress for it and go out to play. Living in Wisconsin, this is the attitude you have to have!

Me gusta viajar (I like to travel) is a song that lends itself to really fun actions and also to being illustrated. It teaches lots of vocabulary, but so logically that kids will learn it without realizing it. The song begins Me gusta viajar….por cielo, por tierra o…por el mar (I like to travel… through the sky, over the land or… by sea). The verses that follow are about how we travel in those places, and carefully incorporate the vehicles carro, tren, bote de vela and avión (car, train, boat, plane), the opposites abajo – arriba and rápido – lento (above – below and fast – slow) and words we use with geography like cerro, puente, ciudad, campo, and bahía (hill, bridge, city, countryside and bay). There is plenty of repetition and an overall symmetry that makes the song very easy to learn.

Los días de la semana teaches the days of the week and a lot more Spanish. As vocabulary, the days of the week are very abstract. The words only have meaning in association with something concrete (you can get a sense of this if you try to describe the essence of Monday and distinguish it from Tuesday). The song Los días de la semana provides that association by pairing the days of the week with different actions and body parts. Lunes, levanto los dos brazos. Martes, yo salto en un pie. (Monday, I lift my two arms. Tuesday, I jump on one foot). This is a cumulative song, so each time you add a day and action, you go back and sing the other days too. It is active, fun and a wonderful way to learn Spanish.

Los días de la semana is a great example of a children’s song that could, and should, be used at other levels. Middle school and high school classes would learn the days of the week in no time, and also learn body parts and verbs in a natural, entertaining way.

This CD also has an well-chosen selection of traditional songs. These are some of the best known children’s songs throughout the Spanish-speaking world. They include Que llueva, La cucaracha, Los elefantes and El barco chiquito. They are songs that children learning Spanish will love and also a part of the cultural knowledge that is so important in learning a language.

Use these links for more information about Whistlefritz  and to hear clips of the wonderful Spanish songs on Cha, Cha, Cha.

The Brainy Company makes a variety of products for introducing children to Spanish. Last week they sent me the Bilingual Baby DVD, the Brainy Baby Spanish/English:Simple Words and Phrases Book and the Brainy Baby Spanish/English:Simple Words and Phrases Flashcards. These items are available individually or as the Brainy Baby Spanish & English Bundle Collection.

Bilingual Baby DVD
The Bilingual Baby DVD is a wonderful collection of images to support a voice-over narration of basic Spanish words and phrases. There is no story, but this DVD is surprisingly engaging and entertaining. The live-action video of people and animals has wonderful colors and the pacing is just right. It holds a child’s attention and yet it is never too busy or overwhelming.

The DVD is intended for children ages 1-5 and introduces basic words and phrases. For example, the video teaches niño, niña, manzana, cama, libro, comer, dormir and leer. Children hear individual words pronounced and then combined into sentences. The video shows fun images of exactly what they are hearing. The DVD also introduces the numbers one through ten, the question ¿Cuántos hay? (How many are there?), colors and the question ¿De qué color es? (What color is..?). The structure of the video provides for lots of repetition of language with a great variety of images.

The native-speaker narration on this DVD is excellent. One woman does all of the voice-over and she has a warm, expressive voice. The inflection is just what you would use talking to children.

The video shows the Spanish text on the screen, but I do not think children get anything out of seeing the words. I understand that parents may want to know how the words are spelled, but children in this age group who are being introduced to Spanish as a second language are not learning to read in Spanish. They are learning by watching and listening.

At the beginning, the DVD explains that the English words are only on the screen for a moment in order not to distract the kids. The Spanish text could also be distracting for some children at first, but they will quickly ignore it. The pictures are too engaging for them to pay much attention to text in any language.

The DVD is about 40 minutes long. Children certainly do not have to sit through the entire DVD at one time. There is lots of repetition and recycling of language, so you can stop and start at any point. This is a video that children will continue to learn from as they watch it again and again.

Brainy Baby Spanish & English Simple Words and Phrases Book
This is a sturdy board book intended for children ages 1-5. The book is big, a great size for kids, and it has really wonderful photographs. The pictures illustrate common Spanish words and phrases including greetings, body parts, colors and numbers. The vocabulary in the book corresponds to a large extent to the vocabulary in the Bilingual Baby DVD.

To make the most of this book, move the language beyond the pages. With the parts of the body this is easy. After you point to the pictures in the book and say the words, point to your own eyes and nose, or your child’s, and say the Spanish words. With the numbers, count fingers and toes in Spanish. The verbs in the book are in the infinitive (comer – to eat, dormir – to sleep). An easy way to move beyond the book is to say Vamos a comer (Let’s eat) or Vamos a dormir (Let’s sleep) and then act out the action together.

This is a short book with relatively few Spanish words, so I was disappointed to find several misprints in the Spanish. For example, after introducing the words perro (dog) and gato (cat), the book asks “Do you have a dog or a cat?” The Spanish in the book is ¿Tiene un perro o un gato? The verb should be tienes. Tiene can mean “do you have,” but it is not the verb form used with children in most of the Spanish-speaking world. Later in the book the less formal form is used in the phrase te quiero, so tiene without the s is probably a misprint. If you get this book, read the question ¿Tienes un perro o un gato? Also, the word for the number ten, diez, is misspelled. The book spells it with an “s” instead of a “z.”

This is a book that you will read aloud to your child, so the errors will not affect its usefulness. It is just disappointing that more care is not taken in proofreading Spanish language materials for children.

Brainy Baby Spanish & English Simple Words and Phrases Flashcards
I do not use flashcards with children of any age who are learning Spanish. but I think these cards can be useful as activity cards. As activity cards, they serve as a reference or a label as you play with your child using Spanish words.

These cards are big and sturdy, meant to be handled by little fingers. You can use them to do lots of different activities with your child. Here are a few simple ideas:

1. Match objects to the cards. Play with three or four words at a time. Assemble objects shown in the cards and match them up. Say the words on the cards as you put the card with the object.
2. Move around the house placing the cards next to objects. La puerta, el reloj, los zapatos, un huevo (the door, the clock, the shoes, an egg) – label objects where they are and then collect the cards again. Say the Spanish words as you play.
3. Put three or four color cards out on the floor. Collect things of that color around the card. Repeat the Spanish color word as you collect and point to the objects.
4. Put three or four number cards out. Bring objects to make the picture on the card (2 cookies, 3 blocks) or the same number of different objects.
5. Take the cards in the car.  Choose one color to look for. When you find three things, choose another card.
6. The color cards are hand prints. Make your own hand prints in the different colors. Say the color words as you make the pictures.

Again, I was disappointed to find several misprints and vocabulary errors.
- The number diez is misspelled, as it is in the book. It is spelled with an s on the card.
- The number dos is also misspelled. The card shows the pronunciation guide (dohs) as the Spanish spelling.
- The words for basketball and baseball on the cards are not the words for the balls. The cards show a basketball and a baseball. They are labeled with the words baloncesto and béisbol. These words can only be used to refer to the sports. On the other side of the card there is a related word, anaranjado (orange) for basketball and círculo (circle) for baseball. Given these descriptive words, and the fact that all the cards refer to objects, it is unlikely that the cards were intended to refer to the sports and not the balls in the picture. The most common words are balón and pelota.

As with the book, these cards can be useful in spite of the errors. It is just too bad that the same attention to detail that went into the Bilingual Baby DVD was not given to the book and flashcards.

Talking to The Brainy Company
I always send companies a draft of a review before I publish it. When I sent The Brainy Company the draft of this post, I wrote a very nice email (really!) saying that I hoped the representative would forward the review to someone who could see that the errors were corrected if they ever updated the products. I pointed out that the review was positive and said that I thought they would want to know about the mistakes. This situation comes up fairly often, and companies usually appreciate the feedback and free proofread. Last week someone offered me a job.

The representative at The Brainy Company told me that they had consulted with several professionals when they made the products, that there are differences in dialect and usage and that they were never going to make 100% of people happy.

Needless to say, I do not agree. I think that you can make 100% of people happy by spelling diez with a z, and dos without an h.

Getting beyond the misprints, obviously there are differences in dialect and usage, but as professionals we have an obligation to teach a standard, useful vocabulary. I believe that companies selling educational products to teach children Spanish have the same obligation. I am the first to recognize that although I have never heard or seen baloncesto used to refer to the ball, and cannot find it used that way anywhere, someone somewhere may say it. Does it follow that the word be used on cards for children beginning to learn Spanish as a second language? I am not usually one to turn to the Real Academia Española for backup, but if they do not think baloncesto refers to the ball, I would vote for a more standard word choice.

Do you have thoughts on the quality of Spanish language products for kids? How can parents who do not speak much Spanish make good choices when buying language products for their kids? Would you buy a children’s book in English with misprints? I would love to hear your thoughts!

Do you have children starting Spanish in school? If you are looking for games and activities to supplement what they are doing in class, The Everything Kids’ First Spanish Puzzle and Activity Book has lots of fun ways to practice basic Spanish.

Kids who like word games and activity books will love this book. It is packed with mazes, codes, word searches, hidden pictures and other puzzles that reinforce basic Spanish vocabulary and concepts. There are brief explanations, but the book does not teach the material in depth. It provides an entertaining way to review and expand on what a child has seen in class. If the information is new, the activities serve as a brief introduction to the vocabulary. The book has the answers to all the puzzles in the back.

Most of the activities are based on translation, so there is a mix of English and Spanish. For several of the activities, kids do a puzzle in English to discover a Spanish word or phrase. Because of the English, the book is not a good choice for children in immersion programs. However, for kids using books that include English translations, lots of the activities match material taught in beginning classes.

I like the variety of short, quick activities like mazes, codes, dot-to-dots, word searches, crosswords, tongue twisters. Also, the pages are big enough to write on easily and there is enough space in the blanks to make the activities fun to do. The book is for ages nine and up, and it could certainly be used with middle school students. Because the Spanish makes these games and activities more challenging, it appeals to a wider age range.

This is a book of written activities, but I like the way it encourages children to speak Spanish. There are pronunciation keys for all the Spanish words and the instructions tell kids to say the words out loud, or to try to say a phrase three or five times fast. There are never too many words on a page, so saying the words is fun, not overwhelming.

The Everything Kids’ First Spanish Puzzle and Activity Book has too many activities to go into much detail, but I want to mention a few of the ones that I particularly liked. One is called Sad Man, Glad Man, where kids draw expressions in labeled circles before following the happy faces like a maze. Drawing the faces is fun! The models for the faces are easy, and kids will quickly learn the Spanish words feliz, enfadado, triste, cansado and miedo.

There is an activity with con (with) and sin (without) where kids match simple descriptions to pictures. This is an effective way of teaching these two important words. I also like the group game in the book that teaches how to tell time in Spanish. There are several written activities on telling time too, so kids can get more practice.

If you are considering getting this book for your child, you should be aware that there are a few misprints. These matter because they cause agreement errors and several of the activities teach agreement. Here are the ones I noticed:

p. 28, the book has pan tostada, but it should be pan tostado (pan is masculine).
p. 65, the word quarto should be spelled cuarto.
p. 78, tengo mucho hambre should be tengo mucha hambre (hambre is feminine).
p. 92, the written accent and pronunciation key are wrong for the word alergias. There is no written accent on the word (the book has one on the i). The stress falls on the e in the next-to-the-last syllable.The ia combine in one syllable (a dipthong).
p. 118, the book has una papá for father. It should be un papá.

The book is still useful, even with the mistakes; you can just correct them. Kids will have a great time doing the puzzles and they will spend more time thinking about Spanish as they do. I would just use the errors as an opportunity to talk to kids about how it is important to be careful with spelling and agreement and about how everyone makes mistakes, even busy copy editors.

Disclosure: The company sent me a copy of the book to write this article. All of the ideas and opinions are my own.

 Learn Spanish Today 

Kids can learn lots of Spanish by measuring. I use measuring as an at-home activity with my students to practice vocabulary and numbers. In addition to the names of the objects they measure and the tools they use, kids learn words like ancho (width), largo (length), alto (height) and the verb medir (to measure). There are lots of online activities in Spanish to teach measuring that work well with children learning Spanish.

This is a great Spanish language activity for learning linear measure. It is from the Instituto de Technologías Educativas. The direct link to the activity is below. Here are a few suggestions for getting the most out of doing it with your Spanish language learners.

Vamos a medir (Let’s measure) teaches kids to measure una mesa (table) and then una alfombra (rug). Click on the table to begin. The graphics make the meaning of the words el largo (length), el ancho (width) and el alto (height) clear. Be sure to say the words out loud with your child.

The next screen explains that you are going to measure the table twice, with palmos (handspans) and un metro (a tape measure). It shows la tabla (the table) where you will write your measurements. Read this screen with your child. Look at the table where you will put the measurements you take.  It is a good summary of the rest of the activity. When your child understands what she will be doing, click seguir .

Next, you choose what you want to measure with first, palmos or el metro, and then you measure the table. When you click on the measurement you are going to take, el largo, el ancho or el alto, tools appear on the right side of the screen.

The tools are very easy to use. Kids see the words poner (to add another handspan) and quitar (remove a handspan) for measuring with palmos. They see the verbs estirar (to stretch, extend, the tape measure) and encoger (to make the tape measure shorter) for measuring with el metro. There is a zoom so you can read the numbers on the tape measure.

Click here to do the online measuring activity with Spanish vocabulary and numbers. Be sure to talk to your child using the vocabulary. You can use sentences like these:

Vamos (Vas) a medir con palmos. – We are (you are) going to measure with hands.
Vamos (Vas) a medir con el metro. – We are (you are) going to measure with the tape measure.
Vas a medir el largo. – You’re going to measure the length.
Pon otro palmo. – Add another hand.
Quita un palmo. – Take off a hand.
¿Cuántos palmos mide? – How many hands does it measure?
Anótalo en la tabla. – Write it in the table.
Ahora mide el ancho. – Now measure the width.
Estira el metro un poco más. – Extend the tape measure a little more.
Encoge el metro un poco. – Shorten the tape measure a little.
¿Cuántos centímetros mide de ancho? – How many centimeters wide is it?

Click Ya está (Done) to go to the next screen.

When your child has measured the table with palmos and with el metro, she can go back and measure the rug. She will use pies (feet) and el metro.

On the first screen where you choose to measure the table or rug, there is a section called Práctica. The first three activities have to do with converting units in the metric system, for example from centimeters to meters. The last exercise, Insectos, involves guessing how long a bug is, and then dragging a ruler to measure it. It works really well and is fun, especially if you like bugs! The insects that you measure are:

la mosca de carne – blue bottle fly
la avispa – wasp
la pulga -flea
el saltamontes – grasshopper
el piojo – louse (lice in the plural)

This make-your-own online puppet show is a great way to get kids speaking Spanish or any language. Start by choosing scenery and characters. Then you can move the characters around and have them talk to each other. They automatically turn toward each other, and you can move them below the level of the stage. There are four scenes to choose from and four pairs of characters.

This activity is on UpToTen – one of the best kid sites in English and French (it is completely bilingual). If you have little ones or your kids are learning French, you are probably familiar with UpToTen and the clever stories, games and songs. Lots of the activities can be used with Spanish language learners, too.

Many of the suggestions below appy to playing with any puppets or toy figures. The advantage of the online puppet show is that children do not have to worry about holding and moving the characters, and they can watch the show as they make the figures talk.

Link to Spanish speaking activity: Make your own puppet show

Even a very short, simple conversation in Spanish is great practice for kids. Here are a few suggestions to get beginning learners speaking Spanish with the puppet show:

- Play together. You make one character move and talk, and your child makes the other move and talk.

- Kids learning Spanish have a limited vocabulary, so it is easier to make the characters talk if you establish a situation first. Decide before you start, saying for example, “Claudia just moved into the neighborhood and she is introducing herself to everyone,” or, “Max is looking for his dog.”

- Give the puppet show a name that sums up the situation. For the examples above, Me llamo Claudia and ¿Donde está mi perro? are good titles because they are sentences you will say as you play.

- Base the show on one or two repeated phrases. Use the same pattern for the whole puppet show. For the examples above you could say:

- Hola, me llamo Claudia. ¿Cómo te llamas?
- Hola, Claudia. Mucho gusto. Me llamo Miguel. (Then Claudia moves on to greet another character.)

- No veo mi perro. ¿Dónde está mi perro?
- No sé. Lo siento. (Then Max moves to the next character to ask where his dog is.)

- Use four characters (the maximum the program allows) so that one character can say the same thing to three others.

- Have an ending to your puppet show. It can be very simple. For the examples above, Claudia can say ¡Adios amigos! Max can say ¡Veo mi perro! or just ¡Mi perro!

- Use different voices if you are speaking for more than one character. This makes simple conversations more interesting.

- Use the puppet show as a setting for kids to sing a song (or a line of a song) or count. Try shows like Me gusta contar where a character counts everything or counts all the time or Me gusta cantar where a character says Me gusta cantar and another says Me gusta cantar también and then they sing together. Make funny variations where no one else likes to sing or count, or where a character will not stop singing or counting.

- Sing call and response songs with the characters, like a Spanish greeting song, or Te quiero.

- The scenery in this puppet show is basic, but there are things to talk about. Use simple sentences with verbs like Veo /¿Ves? (I see / Do you see?) and hay (there is, there are). Here are a few suggestions for using the scenery:

In the fall scene, a character can count the leaves: Me gusta contar. ¿Cuántas hojas hay? (I like to count. How many leaves are there?)

In the castle scene, they can count the windows on the castle (there are lots!): Me gusta contar. ¿Cuántas ventanas hay? (I like to count. How many windows are there?)

In the house scene, there are colored flowers on the wall and other colors in the room. A character can say: Me gustan los colores. Veo verde. Veo azul. (I like colors. I see green. I see blue.)

In the beach scene, they can talk about el sol (sun), las nubes (clouds), el velero (sailboat), la sombrilla (umbrella) el vestidor (changing room), la arena (sand), el mar (sea) and las olas (waves) using veo, ¿ves?, allí está(n), and hay.

Practice your puppet show and present it for family and friends. If your child has fun with one show and wants to do it over and over, that is great. Repetition is important. Have fun!

Spanish in a Basket was such a treat to get in the mail! It is a lovely wicker picnic basket filled with bright, beautiful toys to help introduce children to Spanish. When I opened the basket, I found colorful wooden fruits and vegetables, hand-knit finger puppets, soft animal friends, and a bright table-setting. There were also 4 CDs and a DVD with 20 audio Spanish lessons for kids ages 3 to 8.

Beth Manners, creator of Spanish in a Basket, understands that children learn language through movement, interaction with the world around them and repetition. Spanish in a Basket applies these concepts in an original product designed to engage children with Spanish from an early age.

The idea is that children listen to the audio CD (or DVD) and follow instructions by using the objects in the basket, doing lots of actions, and repeating the Spanish they hear. The program creates a context by introducing two characters, Bobby and María, that are used in the different lessons. The way children use the objects and other actions reinforce the meaning of the Spanish they are learning.

You can read specific descriptions of these Spanish lessons for kids and listen to lots of sound samples at Beth Manner’s Fun French and Spanish. You can order Spanish in a Basket there too, along with Beth Manner’s award-winning CDs for teaching kids Spanish.

The sound quality of the CDs in Spanish in a Basket is excellent and that is important because children can repeat accurately. The native-speaker pronunciation is clear and there is enough repetition that children will absorb the sounds of Spanish. The catchy songs use the vocabulary and structures and incorporate movement. There are also simple stories using the vocabulary, letting children listen first, and then repeat.

For parents who want to teach their children Spanish, Spanish in a Basket is an excellent introduction to teaching language. By participating with their children, parents will get an idea of how to create a context, build in repetition and associate language with actions.

Playing with your child also adds an important visual dimension to the lessons. The audio goes by quickly, and if a young child is not focused, she may not completely follow what she is supposed to do or say. There is lots of repetition, but with you playing along, she will stay more engaged and she can see the actions and objects that match the words. This is particularly important when the program is introducing several new vocabulary words. It can be hard to hold onto the meaning and sound of a new word. With an adult providing a visual clue, children will understand and absorb the Spanish they hear.

The other advantage to participating with your child is that you can control the pacing. If your child loves a game or a song, you can back up and play or sing again. If she is distracted for a moment, you can pause the CD. If the lesson is challenging, you can start again. The lessons are of a very reasonable length, between 7 and 15 minutes, but to make the most of the material you will want to be engaged with your child.

These Spanish lessons for kids are intended to be used over and over. The more exposure the better! Ideally, you will play with your child a few times. Once she is confident with the lesson she will have a great time going back and doing it independently.

There is lots of Spanish learning material in this basket. It would be an excellent choice for a preschool. In fact, there is also a program for schools, which is even more complete than these lessons. This program would also be great for friends who want to start a Spanish play group, or a family that wants to do something new and fun together. Spanish in a Basket is a fun and effective way to introduce a child to Spanish. With friends, it is even more fun!

Disclosure: The company sent me Spanish in a Basket to write this article. All the ideas and opinions are my own.

I was excited to see Juanita Ulloa’s name in my inbox recently.  She wrote suggesting that Spanish Playground readers might be interested in her songs for children learning Spanish. Juanita Ulloa is one of the nation’s leading bilingual performers and songwriters. You can read more about her wonderful music on the Juanita Ulloa website. Juanita’s latest CD of music for children, ¡Canta mi son!, has won a National Association of Parenting Products Gold award and a Disney iParenting Media award. Her voice and her music, for children and adults, are amazing!

Juanita has lots of great songs for kids, some of them particularly good for children learning Spanish as a second language. Her music exposes children to native-speaker pronunciation and has a strong cultural component, as it is closely tied to the musical traditions of Mexico and other Latin American countries. In addition, in her songbooks for Volumes 1 and 2 of Canta conmigo there is a teacher/parent guide that has dance, movement, and cultural explanations and suggestions.

Juanita has generously offered to share one of her songs here on the website. You can listen to all of Yo puedo contar de 1 a 10 below. I will mention a few other songs here too, and be sure to listen to the clips available on her website to get an idea of the wide variety of music she has available.

The album links take you to Juanita Ulloa’s page of music for learning Spanish. Scroll down to the album and click on listen. These are a few songs that work especially well with Spanish language learners:

¿Cómo estás, amigo? – on the CD Canta conmigo (Volume 2)
This is a wonderful call and response greeting song in two languages. It goes beyond ¿Cómo estás? Muy bien to include two common expressions that we use in Spanish when we meet someone. Mucho gusto and encantada/o are polite phrases that all children learning Spanish should know. This song would be an excellent way to begin a discussion of the importance of greetings, good-byes and related polite behavior in Latino culture.

¿Cómo estás, amigo? is also a good way to introduce, or reinforce, adjective agreement as girls sing encantada and boys sing encantado. One of the great benefits of music in learning Spanish is that children produce natural, correct structures and repeat them over and over. By making encantado/a agree with their gender, children begin to internalize the concept of agreement.
The song is in Spanish, then English. It also speeds up the second time around. The change in tempo makes is especially fun to sing.

Yo puedo contar de 1 a 10 – on the CD Canta Conmigo (Volume 1)

This is my new favorite counting song. It has a fabulous rhythm! Kids count to ten and then back down – al derecho y al revés.

You can listen to it here: Yo puedo cantar de 1 a 10

This song has something I always look for in counting songs and that is useful language in addition to numbers. As I mentioned, one of the benefits of music is that children repeatedly produce correct, natural Spanish. So, the best songs for learning Spanish have structures and vocabulary that children can use in many situations. Singing Yo puedo contar de 1 a 10, children learn and practice the verb phrase puedo + infinitive and the verb form vamos. Even beginning Spanish learners can apply both of these verb forms in other contexts.

The song lends itself to all kinds of activities and actions. The most basic is to have kids make a simple number line and keep the rhythm by drumming on the numbers as they sing them.  You can also assign numbers and have kids, in a line or circle, step forward and then back as the group sings the number. This gets trickier as the song goes faster, so another option is to have kids jump in place.

La carita – on the CD ¡Canta mi son!
I love this mariachi version of La carita. It has the emotion of mariachi music with content for children. This song is available on Juanita’s lastest CD ¡Canta mi son!

In terms of Spanish language learners, this song has lots of practical vocabulary, presented in a structure that makes it easy to learn and retain. The body parts are associated with verbs – una boca para comer, esta nariz es para oler, los oídos son para oir, etc. By adding actions, pointing to the body part and acting out the verb, children are always aware of the meaning of the words they are singing.

Wow wow wow – on the CD Canta conmigo Volume 2
This song is the perfect addition to a unit on animals. It introduces kids to the idea that animal sounds are expressed differently in different languages. The dog that says arf, arf, arf if we go to New york, si viajamos a Mexico él ladra wow, wow, wow.

The song is short and easy to learn. Children are always intrigued by animal sounds, and introducing animal sounds in Spanish adds another dimension to activities with animal vocabulary.  Juanita has another super song for kids called El pato, el pollo y el gallo. It also uses animal sounds and kids love it!