I use this Spanish song for kids with preschoolers and beginning language learners. I suggested it on Spanish Playground about a year and a half ago, but I wanted to share a couple of variations and a great video from a preschool in Spain. La luna y el sol teaches basic concepts about the sun and the moon: the moon is small and the sun is bigger; the moon comes out at night and the [...]
Don’t these pigs looks happy? Talk about this great photograph to help your kids 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 pigs as you talk about them. Use gestures, facial expressions and actions to help your child understand what the words [...]
Los pajaritos is one of my favorite Spanish songs for children. It combines common animals, the places they live and the way they move into a pretty song that is perfect for kids learning Spanish. Children can move like the animals or use their hands to show how the animals move. You can also add different animals to make the song as long as you like. This is a traditional song, so there are several [...]
I just watched the Whistlefritz Spanish for Kids DVD – Las estaciones. It is so well done! I am going to explain why I liked it, in detail, but I understand that some of you want just the basics and to know if the product is a good investment. The DVD is intended to introduce kids ages 2-7 to basic Spanish related to the seasons. María is explaining to her friend Fritzi the mouse when [...]
These Spanish poems for children are by Douglas Wright, a well-known author and illustrator from Argentina. He writes poems and songs and, in addition to his numerous books, publishes his work on his blog, El jardín de Douglas. He also generously gives me permission to share them here. I love these two short poems about fall. They are perfect to use with Spanish language learners. The vocabulary is not too complicated, and the rhythm makes [...]
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 [...]
As school starts and the seasons change, teachers and parents will be talking about the months of the year and the calendar. This activity from El hada de papel is great for teaching and talking about the seasons and the months. It is a round calendar of the seasons in Spanish and it is pretty, easy to make, and easy to understand. I like this activity because kids draw a tree for each season, helping [...]
Use the right shape to open the cage and set the animals free! This simple online game was designed to teach basic mouse skills to children. The simplicity of the activity makes it perfect for Spanish language learners. Children can focus on the language, and the bright graphics make the words and structures perfectly clear. The game is one of many on the site El Buho Boo. All of the games lend themselves to [...]
El juego de Beenny (Beenny’s game) teaches children correct Spanish pronunciation, to read and write the sounds of Spanish, and lots of vocabulary. The game is from OnlineFreeSpanish and it is very entertaining! To play, kids guide a bee through a maze. Each time there is a frog blocking the path, the player writes a word by putting the letters in order. There is a picture of the word and a speaker to click to [...]
The Diccionario Multimedia is from the Portal de Educación – Junta de Castillo y León. It has common Spanish vocabulary for kids arranged by categories and represented by pictures. When children click on a picture, they hear the word pronounced in Spanish. There are also two games where they can practice the words that they have learned. Using the Diccionario Multimedia is good pronunciation practice, because children listen and repeat as they learn new Spanish [...]
Escucha, hermano, canción, alegre, nuevo, día, ven, canta, sol, vive, estrellas: these words could come from any picture book or a basic vocabulary list, but they are the words in a classic Spanish song. Miguel Ríos recorded Himno a la alegría in 1969. It became popular all over the Spanish-speaking world and has since been recorded by many artists. Choirs of all ages still sing this song at many different events, and it is one [...]
You might be familiar with Wordle, the really fun website that makes word clouds with any text. Wordle is a great tool for adding Spanish to any space. The program works with individual words, so to make it an effective tool for children learning Spanish you will need to use related vocabulary and add context. You can add context by making a Wordle to describe a photograph and displaying them together. Another option is to [...]