PBS Embracing Bilingualism With New Web Series

These are exciting times for parents looking for resources to teach Spanish to their children. More and more major media companies are venturing into creating content suited to the needs of Spanish-language learners. They are most likely paying attention to the fact that one out of four children in the U.S. are Latinos and Spanish is the second most spoken language in this country. (In fact, the U.S. only trails Mexico as the country where the most Spanish-speakers reside in the world.)

Noah Comprende Launches on PBS Kids Go!

We applaud PBS for the launch of a new web-original series on PBSKIDSGO.org aimed at introducing 6-9 year old children to the Spanish language:  Noah Comprende. The interactive episodes teach kids Spanish words by engaging them in a way they will never know they’re actually “learning” something.

Noah is a 9-year-old boy who doesn’t speak Spanish but is learning it thanks to his Abuela and her neighbors who don’t speak English. I love that they’ve integrated many of the methods, or tips, that we here at SpanglishBaby are always sharing as musts for a successful bilingual upbringing–immersion, especially through a family member such as the Abuela, being one of the keys.

The webisodes have the added bonus of embedded games that make them completely interactive and fun for our active niños. The arcade-style games, such as Word Games which simulates an Atari-like car race, puts your kids directly in the Spanish-language-learning action.

Parents and teachers alike will find the activities area especially useful. Each webisode has an accompanying activity that reinforces the vocabulary words and concepts that were learned. PBS has organized it all neatly and provides printable PDFs of everything you will need for the activities.

The Parent Show Debuts on PBS Parents

On the same week PBS Kids launched Noah Comprende, PBS Parents announced the launch of The Parent Show, a new parenting show hosted by Angela Santomero, better known as the creator of the hit shows Blue’s Clues and Super Why! We were particularly excited about this announcement because I had met Angela back in January when I was invited by PBS to attend an event in Los Angeles. While there, I was asked if I wanted to chat with Angela about raising bilingual kids; that’s when I first found out about The Parent Show. Needless to say, I was completely unprepared, but there was no way I was going to pass up a chance to tell the PBS audience about the thriving community bonding over bilingual and bicultural kids at SpanglishBaby.

Months later, the show finally launched and it included the SpanglishBaby interview as one of the two shows they premiered with! Not only that, but they included great reference links and articles to explore more about bilingualism and the Spanish-language as part of the webisode’s page. How’s that for a lot of bilingualism and Spanish-language love from PBS?!

If you haven’t seen the interview, you can see it below now. We would love your comments as a way of showing how much we all support these efforts and to encourage more media outlets to create quality content for our niños.  (If you’re reading on a feed and it doesn’t show up you can go here to view it. )

Watch the full episode. See more The Parent Show.