Bilingual Friday: Use TV to Learn a Second Language

TV is a wonderful tool for learning Spanish. If you have cable or satellite TV there are several channels you can watch. Many of them have dubbed Spanish over the English of old time favorites. If you don’t want to watch Spanish channels, there’s always “Sesame Street.” They teach Spanish in a fun and simple way to children.

I learned a lot of my Spanish by watching TV. Growing up in Puerto Rico back before there was cable all our TV viewing was in Spanish. We watched cartoons like “Popeye” and “Felix the Cat” in Spanish. (I know I’m dating myself here.) At night shows like “Bewitched” were on, but they were in Spanish too.

Last year while living in Puerto Rico I was given the opportunity to talk about my bilingual books on a children’s TV program. The interview was done entirely in Spanish, well, except for one part where I couldn’t think of how to say something in Spanish. Let’s watch. (This was filmed by friends of mine who went along for moral support. Neither of them speak Spanish.)



I want to challenge you this week. Check your local listings and find a Spanish TV station. Watch a show or cartoon with your children. See if it helps you learn a few words. That’s all it takes, a few words at a time and you could be speaking Spanish in no time.

Let me know how it goes, I really enjoy hearing how people are progressing in their quest to learn Spanish.

Bilingual Friday: Learn Spanish for Kids

If you're looking for a web site that will help you look at many options for helping your children learn Spanish, Learn Spanish for Kids is a good place to start.

The creator of this site has done his reseach. He starts you off with online Spanish lessons. He has links to many sites as well as tips and insight for learning and teaching Spanish.

He shares the best ways to learn Spanish with several links and encourages parents to learn Spanish as well with suggestions for the best ways to learn Spanish.

So, what's your favorite site about learning a second or even a third language? Send them to me and I'll share them in a future Biligual Day posting.

Spanish Friday: Spanglish anyone?

In my never ending searching on the internet for bilingual sites, I came across a very special one. SpanglishBaby, Raisnig Bilingual Kids. This site has just about everything you'd want at your finger tips if you're raising your child to be bilingual in English and Spanish. Come travel with me through the site.

One of their sponsors is Cody's Cuentos. Here you'll find all types of children books read out loud to you and your child. They have them divided into three levels. Basic, intermediate and advanced. Pop in and listen to a story or two.

Besides great blog posts, they have a wonderful bilingual resource list, a bilingual store called La Tiendita and even forums for parents to discuss raising children bilingually. The list of topics range from one-parent-one-language method of teaching to area playgroups for bilingual children and raising children biculturally. Great stuff!

The blog is broken into several article categories. They have:
Must Reads
Reviews and Recommendations
Daily Learning
The Culture of Food
Traditions and Culture
Your Story
Ask an Expert
They have links in the sidebar to each area so you can see articles that pertain just to the topic you want to look at.

So, take some time today and surf around their site. I’m sure you’ll find something that will help you out in your journey to raise bilingual children.

posted by Joy Delgado
We go Beyond Reading
Laughing Zebra – Books for Children
Check out what’s going on at the zoo!
Zooprise Party / Fiesta Zoorpresa blog

Bilingual Day: Learning Spanish Online

Have you ever wondered how to say something in another language but didn’t know where to turn? Do your children have friends whose first language isn’t English? Are they picking up words in a second language? Do you want to learn a second language too?

SpanishDict is a site I’ve used for several years. They will translate single words or whole sentences. What I like about it is they give you several different ways to say what you are trying to say.

For example: I typed in “Here comes the sun.” They came back with their translation as “Aqui viene el sol.” They then gave me a machine translation (Aqui venga el sol.) and Yahoo! Babel Fish translation (Aqui viene el sol.)
Why the different ways to say the same thing? Because different countries same things slightly differently from each other. Similar to the different ways we say things in different parts of the US. (soda or pop or soda pop)

Another thing this site offers is a link at the top of the page, Learn a new Spanish word each day. This is an easy way to learn words little by little.

Still another great part of this site is the Flashcard page. These are fun. Pop over there and see how you do.

There are so many things on this site, you could use it as your online school to learn Spanish. Other links here are:
Reference
Conjugation

So, if Spanish is a language you want to learn, register, set up your own page and start learning.

Have fun!

posted by Joy Delgado
We go Beyond Reading
Laughing Zebra – Books for Children
Check out what’s going on at the zoo!
Zooprise Party / Fiesta Zoorpresa blog

posted by Joy Delgado
We go Beyond Reading
Laughing Zebra – Books for Children
Check out what’s going on at the zoo!
Zooprise Party / Fiesta Zoorpresa blog

Learning Spanish the Fun Way

There are lots of programs out there to teach you Spanish. I’ve searched and found a few that look like lots of fun while learning. Here they are:
Muzzy

Muzzy is in it’s 20th year teaching foreign languages. You can learn Spanish, Italian, French, German and Chinese! Check out Muzzy’s web site or purchse the Spahish version from the link below.



A great site with lots of kid friendly links is put up by the University of Northern Iowa. Bienvenidos offers links to games, lessons. Be aware, some of the links don’t work, but don’t let this keep you from exploring the page. What you do find will be full of information and fun things to do.

Mexico for Kids is a fun colorful site put out by the Mexican government. Here you will play games, learn about the history of Mexico and more interesting things all about Mexico.

So, did this get you in the mood to explore more and see what sites you can find that will help you and your family learn a second, or third language? I hope so. Have fun and I’ll see you back her Monday with another book that goes beyond reading.

posted by Joy Delgado
We go Beyond Reading
Laughing Zebra – Books for Children
Check out what’s going on at the zoo!
Zooprise Party / Fiesta Zoorpresa blog