St. Patrick's Day Mini Vocabulary Puzzles

 

It seems as though St. Patrick's Day sneaks up on me EVERY single year. But I still had time to come up with a free printable activity! This set of St. Patrick's Day Mini Puzzles is headed into the inboxes of all my newsletter subscribers by Wednesday morning. You'll also be able to buy it in my TpT store. 

This year's download is designed to help young students boost their vocabulary while practicing their reading skills.

With this print-and-go activity, all they have to do is cut out the puzzle pieces in the Answer Box and then match them to the image that depicts their word. All the words are related to St. Patrick's Day.

And you can choose to give them the full-color version, or add more time to the activity by having them color in the images first. And, yes, they are available in both English and Spanish. Just choose which version works best for you.

If you'd like to get a copy, scroll to the bottom of this post and be sure to subscribe to my newsletter below. It'll be going out Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning. 

Other St. Patrick's Day Posts You May Enjoy

• Bilingual Activities to Celebrate Saint Patrick's Day
• St. Patrick's Day Bilingual Activity Pack
• 3 Fun St. Patrick's Day Activities
• Free Spanish St. Patrick's Day Printables

My Other St. Patrick's Day Printables

Hey! Consider getting one of my other printable activity sets dedicated to this holiday. There's something for kids of different ages, including a Preschool - Kindergarten Activity Pack, a Book of Words to color and practice writing skills, and finally a Brief History of Los San Patricios for older students. Read more about them here.

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"The Park" Activity for Spanish Learners

 

Spring is trying really hard to push winter out and we are having some beautiful days that allow us to visit the park. Which makes this month's freebie from MommyMaestra sponsor, Spanish for You!, a perfect activity for young Spanish learners!

This month's freebie is an activity for learning park-related words. The Park: What Do You Like? Survey helps your young student learn the vocabulary associated with this place. This two-page download allows students to practice sentence building and conversation. You can also find an audio file below to help with pronunciation.

Download the printable file here

Download the audio file here

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Remember! Spanish for You!'s program is geared for middle schoolers and is the perfect choice for homeschoolers and afterschoolers alike because their concepts are carefully divided up into manageable bundles that are available for immediate download from their website.

If this is your first time here, you can find other free samples from Spanish for You! here. There are some fantastic downloads of games and activities for you and your family to enjoy. If you enjoy this activity, be sure to visit the Spanish for You! website where you'll find tons of additional resources for you to help your young Spanish learner!

Thanksgiving Activity Pack for Preschoolers in English & Spanish

I've been on a creative roll the last couple of weeks. Thanksgiving is possibly my favorite holiday, so I've been digging out all of my Thanksgiving decorations for the house. And although I can't stand to be cold (and, oh, has the wind been so bitterly cold!), I love autumn: the colors, the scents, the images!

My thoughts have been on that early Thanksgiving between the Native Americans and the English settlers. I think about how dreary life might have been for the English without reliable heat, with the loss of loved ones, with illness and starvation. I think about the wives and mothers who braved the long trip at sea to come to this unknown (to them) land and how much courage that must have taken...and how much fear probably accompanied it. Starting over is hard. I've done it several times now. Most recently a year ago when we moved, I hope for the final time, back to Texas.

I think about the generosity of Squanto and his tribe toward these new immigrants who were so very, very different. Even though the relationship between settlers and the indigenous people swiftly deteriorated and led to a complete conquering of several Indian nations, for this brief moment, things were peaceable and life was good between the two. This is the thought that I cling to these days: that people can be good if they choose to be. People can let go of fear and embrace love for themselves and others. Greed can be vanquished, because really, what good is it? We can't take anything with us when we die, except our soul. And, I sure hope that mine is good and reflects love.

Anyway, these thoughts and my creativity have spilled forth into new printables. The first is this Thanksgiving Activity Pack for Pre-K and Kindergarten. It focuses, of course, on those basic skills that our little ones must learn: counting, beginning sounds, letter recognition, new vocabulary, writing skills, and more. But it also quietly reflects friendship, working together, and generosity. I wish my baby boy was old enough to enjoy it now, but he still has a few years to go.

I know that there are quite a few of these available online, but how many are available in both English and Spanish?

I'll tell you about my other fun activity next time. For now, you can find this print-and-go download in my TpT store and MommyMaestra shop.

Enjoy!

Bilingual Valentine's Day Storybook

In need of a quick, noprep bilingual printable for Valentine's Day? Check out my Bilingual Valentine's Day Storybook!

Boost your child's vocabulary and reading skills with this Valentine's Day storybook. This story lists things that children often enjoy on this holiday, so the student will enjoy coloring while learning the words for "balloons/globos," "candy/dulces," "hugs/abrazos" and more.

NOTE! This file contains THREE books:
• a bilingual book (English & Spanish)
• an English only (for ELL)
• a Spanish only (for Spanish learners)

Bilingual Winter Games Puzzle Cards

Are you looking for materials to increase your child's vocabulary in English or Spanish (or both!)? Check out my bilingual Winter Games puzzle cards. They come in three versions: bilingual, English only, or Spanish only.

Simply print on cardstock and cut the cards out. Then have your students find the matching halves. Or, if you have the time, print the black-and-white versions and allow your students to color in the images before cutting out the cards.

You can find your copies in my TpT store or MommyMaestra shop.

Resources for Boosting Spanish Vocabulary in School Subjects

The following is a product review by homeschooling mom, Mireya Marroquin Dunn.

Gracias, MommyMaestra for all the valuable resources you provide on your blog and other social media sites.

Some of your followers just started back to school or homeschool again with their kids, and others are just about to start in the coming weeks. Over the summer, I found a fabulous site that you can use to supplement your child's curriculum with bilingual vocabulary words in subjects other than Language Arts in English or in Español.  Most of us are looking for curricula in Spanish, and MommyMaestra has shared with us great links to Spanish curricula programs that teach Spanish. However, I was not seeing much on the subjects like Science, Math, Social Studies, etc.

[Editor's note: You can actually find resources for studying specific subjects in Spanish on my(MommyMaestra's) Master List of Spanish Curricula.]

Over the summer, I came upon a website called "Mr. Elementary". He has a TPT store and blog. An elementary school teacher, Mr. Elementary has found a way to help his students learn core material topics that are taught throughout the year (vocabulary words) that helps boost comprehension and build confidence.  Why not learn them using trading cards and wall picture cards?  He offers them in an array of topic materials: (Science) the moon phases, the water cycle, simple machines, inventors & scientist: (Math) geometry shapes, fractions, money, place values; (Social Studies) like map skills, communities and conflict and resolution, and many others. Since he had several students that were ESL or ELL, he wanted them to learn and comprehend the use of these vocabulary words. The best part is that these cards are in SPANISH for FREE when you purchase the English version. So your kids can learn them in both languages.  Mr. Elementary offers these topics individually or in a bundle pack to pass on more savings to you.

I started to use the Scientific Tools vocabulary cards (tarjetas de herramientas cientificas), to introduce my teenage son to these Spanish words.  Since he is required to learn biology and a foreign language (2 yrs of the same language), he chose Spanish to earn his high-school credit to graduate. So I thought, why not learn Spanish vocabulary, too? This would give him a boost with his Spanish comprehension.

The cards can be printed on cardstock or copy paper.  You can also print a larger (wall) size version.  I will have them taped to my kitchen wall for a few weeks as we learn about the material.  The colored images are nice and colorful, easy to understand with a brief definition & a sentence, and you can print on the back of the pictured vocabulary trading card.  You also get blank cards so your students/kids can draw their own images and write their own definitions.  These cards can be played as a game or used as a great way to quiz each other.  You can keep them in a nice card box using the fun template that comes included in the download, plus he provides a trading card manual with 15 pages of tips and ideas on how to use these trading cards in your classroom or home.

I am looking forward to getting more topics that my son can relate to his biology class or other subjects while incorporating new Spanish vocabulary words.  It's a plus for me as well.  Since my own education took place here in the United States and I only spoke Spanish at home, I never learned many of these Spanish vocabulary words as I was growing up.  In my opinion, using these bilingual vocabulary trading cards is a great value to your classroom or home, especially since they cover topics that your students/children need to learn throughout the school year.

Gracias por sus atenciones,

Mireya Marroquin Martinez Dunn

Free Download: Spanish Back-to-School Scramble

It's time for another free mini-lesson from our sponsor Spanish for You! Your Spanish learner will love this Back-to-School Scramble activity. 

This mini-lesson can be done alone or in a group. It teaches key vocabulary associated with school items such as notebooks, markers, folders and more.  The 6-page lesson comes with worksheets, activities, and a blank box sheet, as well as the audio to help you with the pronunciation of each word. This is a fun mini-lesson!

Click here to download this file

If this is your first time here, you can find other free samples from Spanish for You! here. There are some fantastic downloads of games and activities for you and your family to enjoy.

And to supplement this lesson, check out these books in Spanish that celebrate going back to school! 
The links below are affiliate links

• Como van a la escuela los dinosaurios? by Jane Yolen and Mark Teague
• Que Nervios! El Primer Dia de Escuela by Julie Danneberg and Judy Love
• My School/Mi Escuela by Ginger Foglesong Guy and Vivi Escriva
• Mi Escuela/My School (We Are Latinos) by George Ancona

Free Booklet for Vowel Recognition in Spanish

June's freebie from our sponsor, Lectura para niños is a fun booklet to strengthen your child's ability to identify vowels and sight words in Spanish.
Leah says...

Here is a “portion” of a bigger item that I have on TPT that you can get here. You will get 8 of 23 pages from this bundle.

These little books are a fun and interactive way to learn how to read and reinforce the vowels in Spanish.

This book provides opportunities to:

• reinforce the beginning sounds of each vowel
• correspond pictures to the correct vowel sound
• segment words into syllables
• learn to read sight words with automaticity

Here is a link to access all of the other little readers I have created for this series.

I use these little books weekly to increase knowledge of letter naming, sounds, blending and segmenting words. You do NOT have to use the MARAVILLAS reading series to use these little books. One pair will work on this mini reader during their small reading group. They will review these books daily before being introduced to a new letter/word in the following week. Each week gets progressively harder and reinforces the learning from the week before.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THIS FILE

For more awesome Spanish materials, especially those that teach children to read in Spanish, check out Lectura para niños on Facebook, Teachers Pay Teachers, Blog, and Pinterest.

Free Download: Alphabet Letters Game in Spanish

Has your child decided to learn a new language this summer? Maybe your whole family has decided to learn Spanish! If so, you're going to really enjoy this month's Spanish-learning freebie from our sponsor Spanish for You! 

If you're looking for a way to boost your Spanish spelling skills or even just simply test your knowledge of Spanish vocabulary, this is a great game for you! This Alphabet Letters Game comes with letter cards and directions for playing. (It's sort of like scrabble, but not different.) It also includes an audio file to help the players/learners with the pronunciation of the letters in Spanish.

Click here to download this file

If this is your first time here, you can find other free samples from Spanish for You! here. There are some fantastic downloads of games and activities for you and your family to enjoy.

Thanks, Spanish for You!

Free Download: Letter G Unit to Accompany Maravillas Sapnish Reading Program

This post uses affiliate links.

Learning to read is the most fun whenever the materials are colorful and engaging and the activities are clever and effective. That is why I love this month's free download from our sponsor Lectura para niños! The download is a set of engaging worksheets to accompany McGraw-Hill's Lectura Maravillas reading program that Leah uses with her students.  

(PSST! Parents, you can find more affordable Maravillas textbooks here on Amazon [aff link].)

Leah says:

This week focuses on the letter G and new sight words: quién and al. It also reviews all previous words taught from the other little reader books.

Each week these books get progressively harder while adding a new letter/syllable of the week as well as 2 new sight words.

The 1st and 2nd pages introduce picture vocabulary that begin with the sound /g/. The 2nd page also provides a game board to use as you wish. In my class I teach them how to play so when I send this home for homework, they can play with their family to make reading a little bit more fun. In class, we mainly just read around the board. This helps the child focus on the word. I like the colors with this game because children with visual focusing disorders have a hard time tracking. The colors help with this.

On the 3rd page there is fluency practice to review a) lowercase letters taught to date, b) uppercase letters taught to date, c) sight words taught to date, d) syllables of the week

With my INTENSIVE students, I make sure if there is an error made, we go back two letters and keep reviewing until we have the letter correct.

With my at level and above level students, we read this page for speed and automaticity.

On the 4th page the students have to

a) Listen to the teacher say 2 words that begin with the /g/ sound and find a picture that begins with this sound.

b) Listen to the teacher say 2 words with the /g/ sound in the middle of the word, then find a picture that has the /g/ sound in the middle of the word.

On the 5th page, the students have to

a) Look at the picture at the beginning of the column, then circle the WORD that has the same BEGINNING sound.

b) Look at the picture at the beginning of the column, then circle the WORD that has the same MIDDLE sound.

On the 6th page, the students have to read words and draw a line to the corresponding pictures.

On the 7th page, the students have to practice segmenting words while looking at the sounds as well as with their eyes closed!

On the 8th page, the students have to read the sentence and draw a line to the picture that corresponds with the sentence.

This link will take you to all of the little reader books that I have created to go along with Maravillas reading series. You do not need this series in order to use these books. These books all reinforce phonemic awareness and phonics in the Spanish homeschool and or classroom.

DOWNLOAD THIS FILE HERETHIS FILE HERE

For more awesome Spanish materials, especially those that teach children to read in Spanish, check out Lectura para niños on Facebook, Teachers Pay Teachers, Blog, and Pinterest.

Tu Historia Preferida CDs

Another special find for homeschooling families today. I was recently contacted by Tu Historia Preferida, the Spanish division of Your Story Hour (YSH), to review one of their CD sets. According to their website, YSH is a "global, non-profit, interfaith Christian educational organization working with children, youth and families of all denominations." Their radio show focuses on teaching kids family values and lessons through engaging stories.

Tu Historia Preferida (THP) was launched in 1985 and produces stories in Spanish. Radio stations throughout Latin America, Europe, and the U.S. run the stories. They also offer audio CDs for purchase via the YSH website.

I received their Historia 1 CD set. The stories included are:

• Mas Allá de Horizonte
• El Descubrimiento de América
• El Regreso de Colón
• Las Cadenas de Colón
• Benito Juárez...Benemérito de las Americas I
• Benito Juárez...Benemérito de las Americas II
• Benito Juárez...Benemérito de las Americas III
• Benito Juárez...Benemérito de las Americas IV
• El Hombre sin Patria
• El Muchacho que se Escapó

I'm not a fan of Christopher Columbus, but do realize that he is an important figure in history. I did, however, LOVE the stories of Benito Juárez. The stories are really well done and engaging for both adults and children. Various voice actors play the parts of the different characters, and they even include sound effects to accentuate the story. Ileana Gutierrez (Tía Eleana) and Thony Escotto (Tío Daniel) are the hosts of the Spanish radio show and they introduce the stories.

The English YSH CDs are also available for download as MP3s. I also went online and ordered a few of them to explore with my kids. I love some of the titles in their Great Stories series!

Unfortunately, the Spanish versions are only available on CD. But if you don't mind waiting a few days to receive your CD album, this is an awesome resource for enriching your homeschool lessons! 

Spanish Classroom Poster Set from Monarca Language {GIVEAWAY}

One of the best things you can do to raise literate children, is to create a print-rich environment for them. By now, you know how much emphasis we place on pre-literacy and literacy skills for our children. So you can imagine our delight when one of our blog sponsors - Monarca Language - agreed to giveaway a set of their Spanish classroom posters to one MommyMaestra reader!

We know a lot of Spanish & bilingual education teachers follow along, but this giveaway is also for parents who are eager to nurture their child's biliteracy skills. Are you teaching your child to speak or read in Spanish? These wonderful posters are a great tool for both Spanish learners and beginning readers. They are a lovely way to decorate your child's bedroom, the refrigerator, your home library or classroom (ahem - homeschoolers!), or any spot in your home.

You can use the posters in conjunction with your Monarca Language subscription, or to supplement any curriculum.

Teachers, wouldn't these posters be a wonderful addition to your classroom decor? The set comes with more than two dozen posters - 29 to be exact - covering a range of topics, including the seasons, numbers, shapes, and classroom rules & activities.

I love how they are colorful and adorable, perfect for attracting your child's attention. Parents, in addition to hanging them up around the house, be sure to take the time to point them out and talk about what they represent.

The winner will receive a downloadable file from Monarca Language so that you can print up however many you need. You might prefer to print just a few at a time and switch them out over the course of the year. This helps to keep your child engaged and learning.

To enter the giveaway, just use the Rafflecopter below.

¡Buena suerte!



a Rafflecopter giveaway

Free Download: Describing with Colors Spanish Mini Lesson... Plus Audio

Have you been following along with our Spanish-learning freebies from our sponsor Spanish for You!? If your child is learning how to speak Spanish, then you know how invaluable their materials are! To celebrate my Back-to-School Fiesta, we have another great free download from them for all of you.

The Describing with Colors Mini Lesson includes five pages of activities plus an audio file to help your student learn the right pronunciation for the vocabulary in this lesson.

Click here to download this file

If this is your first time here, you can find other free samples from Spanish for You! here. There are some great downloads of games and activities for you and your family to enjoy.

And to supplement this activity, here are some great bilingual and Spanish-language books centered around colors: (These are affiliate links.)

• Spicy Hot Colors: Colores Picantes by Sherry Shahan
• Colores Everywhere!: Colors in English and Spanish by San Antonio Museum of Art
• My Colors, My World/Mis colores, mi mundo by Maya Christina Gonzalez
• Colors! ¡Colores! by Jorge Luján

Free Spring Word Search in Spanish with Audio

Wow! Yesterday around here it was almost HOT. What a joy after such a long, long winter! We are so ready for spring and it makes me happy to see the trees budding and the daffodils blooming all around our property.

Therefore, this month's freebie from our sponsor, Spanish for You!, is very much appreciated. It is a spring word search and sentence builder. Expand your child's Spanish vocabulary with this activity, and if you are worried about pronunciation - don't! Debbie has included an audio file with all of the vocabulary words.

Click here to download this printable

An Affordable Spanish Curriculum for Home or Classroom

If you are looking for a curriculum to help your child learn Spanish, you should definitely look take a look at Spanish for You!'s website. Created by a teacher, the program is designed for elementary and middle-school students. It only takes 15 - 30 minutes a day, and they use a lot of fun, interactive games that help your child remember new vocabulary. They even have free mini-lessons and worksheets for you to try out.

If this is your first time here, you can find other free samples from Spanish for You! here. There are some great downloads of games and activities for you and your family to enjoy.

Other Posts You May Enjoy

• Free Seasons Bilingual Minibook for Spanish Learners
  
  
• Free Download: Spring Fun Spanish Learning Calendar
  
  
• Free Download: El Parque y Colores
  
  
• Free Download: Spanish Spring Sentence Pieces

Teacher Highlight: Mr & Mrs Brightside

Today, I wanted to feature this great couple that is creating really fun, educational materials for students in Spanish and English. I stumbled upon them one night while researching on Pinterest, an immediately fell in love with their printables. They are vibrant, cheerful, and full of good information.

Linda and Eric Lopez are two Texas teachers, a husband and wife, who had a hard time finding resources to use in the bilingual classroom. Linda says that they began creating Spanish resources that could help them not only teach but also help their students learn. They strive to make their resources visually appealing yet purposeful. 

I very much appreciate knowing that they personally use all of their resources in their classroom and make them part of their teaching. Linda says that their students are their critics and dictate whether they need changes and/or adjustments. Their goal is to help their students be bilingual and successful. 

Linda says, "We understand that finding good bilingual resources can hard to come by. We want to share our products with teachers and parents alike who understand the importance of being bilingual. Anyone who has worked with bilingual students will tell you it’s twice the work and twice as hard. Don’t lose hope and always look on the Brightside!"

Their store is filled with lots of educational goodies on a variety of topics, but most importantly science and literacy! I don't typically see a lot of science printables in Spanish for kids.

Click here to explore their TeachersPayTeachers store, Mr and Mrs Brightside.

5 Ways to Boost your Child's Spanish Outside the Home

Last month, I wrote the 10 things that I do to help my children's Spanish vocabulary at home. As I am currently traveling with my sons and husband, lucky for us, when we visit family in Chicago, the boys' Spanish flourishes. Everyone in our family speaks fluently and it is the chosen language in all the grandparents' homes.

I understand that this scenario is not the same for many families. On the contrary, some parents do a fantastic job at speaking only Spanish at home and when they step out, the challenge of speaking Spanish while traveling near or far, can become an issue. Here are five things you can do to help boost your child's Spanish outside your home.

1) Spanish books: Wherever you go, there is no doubt that you may need to take out a book during down time. If your goal is to have everyone read 20 minutes a day, you will often find that waiting for a table at your favorite restaurant or a while visiting the doctor's office, a Spanish book in your bag will help pass the time and help your child's Spanish vocabulary immensely.

2) Load your phone with Spanish apps:  My boys are always trying to see when they can sneak some time on my smart phone. I make sure to keep it full of educational and bilingual apps to help when I'm out shopping or waiting to start my carpool duty.

3) Visit places with bilingual voices:  It's really important for bilingual kids to hear other children who speak two or more languages. Play dates, visits to the old neighborhood and a trip to abuelita's house where Spanish is the main language spoken, gives your little ones a huge advantage at listening and practicing their Spanish outside your own home.

4) Explain things in Spanish:  A trip to the museum or even a grocery store is a great time to explain and teach things to your child in Spanish. On a daily basis, you may find yourself using the same vocabulary in your conversations. New situations and teachable moments give you and your child an opportunity to use different words. I often find myself Googling a word's Spanish translation. My boys see that I might not know every word in Spanish, but I sure can find it.

5) Continue to speak to your child in Spanish: My tio Ulises just gave me the best advice: Never compromise your beliefs for the sake of making others feel comfortable. In this day in age, no matter where you live, it is acceptable to speak the language you choose to speak in public--especially if you are simply trying to enforce something as important as a second language. My children are not embarrassed when I speak Spanish to them in public because it has become so natural for us. Who knows? Maybe someone listening to you will inspire them to keep fighting the good fight.

What are some things you do to make sure your child continues to speak Spanish outside of your home?

Betty Galvan, is writing "for smart and stylish moms" over

at My Friend Betty Says... 
She is the mother of three beautiful little boys and a teacher.