Un dragón, un par de zapatos rojos, una manzana.  We pulled these words from our story jar the other day and I ended up telling the story del dragón al que le encantaba el color rojo over and over.

Not every story is the hit that el dragón was, but a story jar adds a bit of randomness and fun to storytelling. It is a jar with words on small pieces of paper, folded so you cannot see the word. Someone draws two or three words and the storyteller incorporates those elements into a story. I have lots of colored scrap paper from preschool Spanish projects, so our story jar is pretty bright. The unrelated words you draw give a little inspiration, and challenge, to the storyteller and add an element of anticipation for the listeners.

In our jar, we put in words like these: lluvia, un dentista, un elefante, un gatito, el color azul, una isla, un teléfono, una princesa, nieve, el número 15, monedas de oro, un avión, una ballena, un circo and lots of other characters and objects.

When we pulled out un dragón, un par de zapatos rojos, and una manzana, the story was of a dragon that loved the color red. He only had red clothes, red toys, red food, red crayons and red paint. That is, until he met a neighbor who loved yellow…

 Telling these stories is a creative activity. If you are the storyteller, you can add patterns and sequences. The same characters can reappear in the stories, so that the storytelling jar starts to take on a life of its own. As always, if the little ones like a certain story, be prepared to tell it over and over!

Listening to stories and telling their own, children learn to structure a narrative. They also practice important language skills like describing, sequencing and cause and effect. We have a wonderful time with this simple activity. It is fun to tell the stories, very entertaining to listen to them and an excellent way to build Spanish language skills.

Special thanks to Spanish Playground for providing this activity. Visit their site for more activities to teach Spanish to kids.

Image source: Flor de la Cruz

This Friday, November 23rd is the 5th annual National Day of Listening — a relatively new holiday created by StoryCorps.

What is it?

The National Day of Listening is a day to honor a loved one through listening – and your opportunity to capture the precious stories of your familia for your hijos, nietos and future generations.

How does it work?

You can have a chat with your mother, your abuelos, a great aunt, sister, tío, your esposo’s step-father, a second primo twice removed – anyone you choose. The conversation can be in English, Spanish o lo que sea! Preserve the story by recording the interview and then it can be uploaded to share with the world.

StoryCorps has teamed up with SoundCloud to create the “Wall of Listening“, where you’ll be able to upload the recording and then easily share it.

How do I record the conversation? Do you have any tips on how to do this?

Answers to all those great questions can be found on the StoryCorps website, in their Do-it-Yourself Instruction Guide, and in their FAQ. Just know that you don’t need fancy recording equipment. While computer programs such as Windows Sound Recorder or apps on your phone will work great, the easiest way to share stories is by using the in-browser recording option. After you click the “Share your story” button and sign up, you’ll be able to choose the “Record” option which will enable you to record directly from your browser.

We hope you’ll share the link to your loved one’s story!

If you participate, we would love for you to share with us by cutting and pasting the link of your recording into a comment on this post!

Happy listening!

Pictures from a familiar story, beads and cord to string them on are all you need to do this activity. With the necklace, your child will be able to tell a story to herself and to family and friends. As they retell a story, children learning Spanish practice vocabulary, sequencing and pronunciation.

To make a necklace you will need small pictures of the story. You can draw them or use clip art. Click here to print pictures to use with Eric Carle’s Oso pardo, Oso pardo ¿Qué ves ahí? Most of the images are black and white so that children can color them. Click here for images to make a necklace to tell Ricitos de Oro y los tres osos.

Making a storytelling necklace

Print or draw pictures for a familiar story. Use card stock for a sturdier necklace and color them if you like.

Cut out the pictures. Pinch together the top corners and punch a hole through both layers.

Thread the cord through both holes. String the pictures in the order of the story, alternating the pictures with beads.

Tie the ends of the necklace together and tell the story!

Using a storytelling necklace with children learning Spanish

- You can make a storytelling necklace for any familiar story. Stories with patterns work especially well. If the story is new, read the book to your child several times before you make the necklace.

- Have the book available as you make the necklace. Read together what happens and choose the image to put on the necklace.

- The necklace does not have to include an image for every detail in the story. For example, the images for Ricitos de Oro are los osos, la casa, Ricitos de Oro, un plato de sopa, una silla, una cama, los osos, un plato de sopa, una silla y una cama. The picture of the soup reminds children that the first bowl estaba demasiado caliente, the next estaba demasiado fría and finally la sopa estaba como a ella le gustaba.

- When the necklace is done, offer to tell your child the story using the necklace. Point to the images as you tell the story.

- When your child tells the story, she may skip pictures or talk about them in a different order. She may change the story entirely and make up her own. However she tells the story, it is good language practice. There is no need to correct or interrupt unless she asks for your help.

- Continue to read the book with the story to your child. The more familiar the story is, the easier it will be for her to use her necklace.

- Encourage friends and family to ask about her necklace and listen to the story. Friends can make the same necklace and they tell the story together. If friends make different necklaces, they can tell stories to each other.

Special thanks to Spanish Playground for providing this activity. Visit their site for more activities to teach Spanish to kids.

Surely, your child has a book she’s especially fond of and loves to be read over and over (and over) again.  She loves to hear how you imitate the sounds of the animals, how you sing the voices of certain characters, she gleefully points to the objects she wants to hear you name for the umpteenth time.  Now, imagine that same story magically brought to life, full of vibrant colors and sounds, to be watched on a screen.

That’s exactly what Moving Picture Books has done with  over 30 classic children’s tales and new favorites.

I found their site on-line some months ago while surfing for quality bilingual videos to bring to you (yep, that’s loads of homework we do around here!)  Their slogan-”Magically bringing storybooks to life!”- instantly grabbed me since it married two of my passions:  books + movies.  Around this house, we read a lot and watch a lot, en español.

What prompted me to contact the company was that they offer the visual storybooks in English and Spanish!  BIG kudos to them for including the Spanish option from the get-go.  So, I gladly accepted the DVD they eagerly sent me to review.

Each DVD comes with three animated storybooks recommended for ages 3mos-7yrs.  I was impressed by the quality and ease of navigation of the main menu.  You can easily choose to view the videos in either English, Spanish or read-along-text (English only).  Guess what option I chose first?

The Spanish translations are impeccable and the voices are professionally narrated by children and adult storytellers.  My daughter, Camila, has a fascination for babies and kids and just loves hearing children’s voices.  She completely identifies and I prefer those voices to be in Spanish.

Visually, Moving Picture Books remains faithful to the illustrators and just “magically” gives life to the artwork using vibrant colors and dynamic animations. This is definitely quality educational material for our bilingual kids!

How to Use Animated Storybooks in your Bilingual Home

How I see you using these animated storybooks at home?  As an imagination-filled compliment to your reading out-loud story time.

Let’s say you have Margaret Wang’s “The Right Shoes for Me” book at home.  You can set a time to read it with your child, have fun acting out the scenes, barking like a dog, and watching him learn to tie his shoes.  Then you ask him if he wants to see the boy and his dog come to life on a screen, hear how the dog really barks and see how the boy tie his shoes.  You either download the video from the Moving Picture Books library (.99 to $1.99 each), get the Apple app, or pop in a DVD (you’ll be able to win some here at the end of this post!) and, voilà, like magia the story you just read together is brought to life in Spanish.

If your family uses the OPOL method, then each parent has the option of playing it in their language.  If your child is learning to read in English, reinforce the process by choosing the read-along-text option.  I’m a little obsessed with options, can you tell?!

I do want to point out that the new DVD sets for sale on their  site do not include the Spanish language track.  It seems odd because they sent me six DVDs to give away that are part of their first set which do include the Spanish option.  These videos are so unique that I wished they would continue creating them in Spanish as well, especially since the full Spanish library is available to download on their site.

On Top of Spaghetti

Here’s the animated storybook of the classic “On Top of Spaghetti” in Spanish that the parents behind Moving Picture Books uploaded to YouTube so that SpanglishBaby friends can enjoy and share.  Scroll down past the video for your chance to win a collection of six DVDs!!

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ddc5OyZMkPM

Win a Set of Six Spanish Language DVDs from Moving Picture Books

This giveaway is now closed. Congratulations to our winner CARRIE_in_TN!!  Thanks to all who entered.

One person will win the complete set of six DVDs with the Spanish language track option.  These are no longer available for sale!  How lucky are we?  All you need to do for your chance to win is visit the Moving Picture Books site here and tell us which animated storybook you would like to watch and why.

If you want to increase your chances of winning you can get additional entries by doing any of the following:

1. Subscribe to our feed via email and leave us an extra comment letting us know you did so. Make sure to leave the comment using the same email you subscribed with. And please make sure you verify the subscription when you receive the email to do so. We do check in order to validate the entry.

2. Subscribe via RSS. Once you do, or if you’re already a subscriber, email us the “Secret Phrase” at the bottom of the post to: giveaways@spanglishbaby.com.

3. Blog and/or Tweet about this giveaway. Just make sure to send us the link in an additional comment below.

For the part that nobody likes, but we’ve gotta have, check out the Giveaway Rules.

This giveaway ends at midnight EST on Thursday August 13, 2009.

Entries/Comments that do not follow the submission guidelines will be invalid and automatically deleted. Sorry, just need to keep it fair. Good luck to all!

Photo by Ordinary Guy

This week, instead of bringing you a video, we want to introduce you to an online audio library of classic children’s fairy tales and original stories in Spanish, from our friends at Cody’s Cuentos. Cody’s Cuentos offers FREE (don’t you just love that word?) weekly podcasts of children’s stories narrated by professional storytellers who speak native Spanish with accents from Mexico, Argentina and Spain.

At eighteen months, Camila is still a bit too young to truly appreciate these podcasts, but I’ve enjoyed listening to them and remembering some cuentos I know I want to start sharing with her soon. I like that it’s an audio story and an often-needed break from the constant visual stimulation our kids get bombarded with in modern life. These tales stimulate their wild imaginations, sharpen their listening skills and engage their growing brains; not to mention it’s an original way to introduce some Spanish to your child’s day.

Other people use these podcasts as a tool for learning and/or practicing their Spanish. A reader of their blog suggested to use the audio stories and transcripts along with puppets. What a great idea!

The team at Cody’s Cuentos have really poured their heart into these podcasts with a very high production value, a pick of professional talent and some great original stories….all for free. Some stories also come with a free transcript, available at their blog.

One of their most popular downloads is the all-time classic “Caperucita Roja.” Check it out below and re-discover the joys of listening and imagining:

Click here to listen to Cody’s Cuentos: Caperucita Roja

Click here for the transcript.

Special offer for SpanglishBaby readers: Get a free enhanced transcript for the audio story “La colcha de retazos“.

Here’s all you have to do:
1). Sign up for Cody’s email list on the Cody’s Cuentos web site or become a “friend” of Cody’s Cuentos on Facebook.
2). Leave a message/comment on the Cody’s Cuentos blog using your real name, a valid email address and the secret password “SpanglishBaby” somewhere in the body of your message.
That’s it! The transcript of “La colcha de retazos” will be emailed to you within 24 hours. Be sure to use a valid email address, otherwise the document will not reach you. Offer valid only today, Tuesday, March 10.

If you like what we’re talking about sign up for free SpanglishBaby updates via email or via RSS. You’ll like it.