Holiday Gifting: Aula Creativa 5

The following is a sponsored post with Nacho Books. All thoughts and opinions are the writer's own.

This review is one of a series of educational books in Spanish available from the new Nacho Books website. Find additional reviews in this series here. 

Aula Creativa 5 “Serie Educatión Artística” by Susaeta

Aula Creativa 5 by Susaeta is part of a series of books designed to support your child’s artistic thinking and skills. This series is all in Spanish and is geared toward advanced Spanish speakers in Pre-K through upper elementary/middle school. You can find the whole series books 1-9 at Nacho Books. 

Aula Creativa 5 introduces a variety of artistic skills, including drawing, mark making, color theory, simple instrument making, origami and more. Each activity is followed by it’s theme, goals, interdisciplinary theme, and further exploration. There are also spaces for recording the students’ prior knowledge and assessment of what they’ve learned through the activity. 

The lessons include jumping off points for studying artists within the western canon, art movements and interdisciplinary themes through a brief paragraph and an internet link for further investigation. For example, an image that asks for elements of an ocean scene be drawn and colored in is followed by a paragraph on what role the oceans and marine life play in Earth’s ecosystem and oxygen production.  The interdisciplinary nature of this book allows for an expansive view of art and how it connects to many areas of life. 

The introduction of the pedagogical approach and book’s structure for parent teachers is thorough and speaks to why and how visual and music education are important in learning and life. This is a great starting point or supplemental book for your child’s visual arts education, and music education to a lesser degree. The structure is good for parents who would like to see how to integrate art in an interdisciplinary way. 

If this sounds like it would support your child’s artistic growth head over to Nacho Books for this series and others on drawing, cutting, and creative writing. 

If you're looking for more art resources, check out these on MommyMaestra:

• Teaching Art to Preschool and Early Elementary Age Children - a complete art lesson for free here on MommyMaestra
• Art for Kids Hub - free online drawing videos for kids of all ages
• 20 Multicultural Children’s Books about Female Artists
• Home Art Instruction with Heron Books - a curriculum review for tweens and teens
• Art for Tweens & Teens: Inky Art School - a free self-paced, 10-day art class online by Scottish artists Johanna Basford

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Monika Aldarondo is a former arts educator, and current photographer and creative shape-shifter with Puerto Rican roots. She posts about her bilingual home/un-schooling journey on Instagram @librolovinmama. Her photography and creative projects can be found at laancla.com.

Nacho Aprende, Lee y Colorea

The following is a sponsored post with Nacho Books. All thoughts and opinions are the writer's own.

This review is one of a series of educational books in Spanish available from the new Nacho Books website that shops these popular books across the United States. Find additional reviews in this series here. 

A Spanish Workbook for PreK - 1st

Nacho Aprende, Lee y Colorea is a fun 192-page practice book for young children from Nacho Books. At first glance it is a coloring book with an image to color on each page that is identified in Spanish and English. A wonderful way to introduce vocabulary in both languages or for English dominant speakers to learn the Spanish vocabulary. It would also work for Spanish dominant speakers who are younger and working on vocabulary development, hand strength and writing skills. 

The images themselves are cartoons of the items or roles connected to the words themselves. However, those looking for culturally sensitive materials should know that it does have a Eurocentric aesthetic. For example, the image for "Indio" has a boy, that does not have indigenous features, with a headband and three feathers... 

A great feature in this book is that the vowel tracing on the first few pages quickly progresses to full sentences to copy by the end of the book. Each phrase or sentence is written in both print and cursive, which is a nice touch. My son and I compared the two and identified similarities and differences in print and cursive so he could see that cursive doesn’t have to be intimidating.

There is an emphasis on syllable recognition. Syllables are highlighted in the main Spanish vocabulary word on each page, in the phrases, and children are given opportunities to fill in the correct syllable for lists of incomplete words several times throughout the book. The visual cues and repetition take it beyond a simple vocabulary coloring book. There are also word searches throughout to reinforce the vocabulary through play. My son was very excited about the word searches...

This book is a great practice workbook for young learners to build vocabulary, writing skills, motor skills and creative expression.

Click over the Nacho Books to order this and other titles to support your child’s emerging reading and writing in Spanish. 

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Monika Aldarondo is a former arts educator, and current photographer and creative shape-shifter with Puerto Rican roots. She posts about her bilingual home/un-schooling journey on Instagram @librolovinmama. Her photography and creative projects can be found at laancla.com.

Cometa Creativa: A Preschool Spanish Workbook

 

The following is sponsored post with Nacho Books. All thoughts and opinions are mine. 

The new school year is quickly approaching for many, but for some of us, schooling happens year round. We take long breaks whenever we need them to clear our minds or to travel. My middle kid is taking a month off for summer, but my preschooler comes up to me almost daily asking to "do school."

A Spanish Preschool Activity Book

Right now, he is in love with Cometa Creativa 1, a preschool workbook that is in Spanish. You can find a copy on Nacho Books' website. 

It is great for both Spanish-speaking students AND for introducing Spanish to your preschooler. It uses art as the bridge for language acquisition. This activity book is full of opportunities to color, trace, match, cut and paste, and more. It covers important concepts such as color and number recognition, opposites, shapes, and introduces the vowels. 

The layout is perfect, too. It is a big book, or at least bigger than your traditional 8.5 x 11. Actually, it is about the size of a placemat (approx. 9 x 13 in.). 

Each page can potentially be removed from the book in case your child is easily distracted or you want your child to only focus on the one activity at a time. And if you do remove them, they come with holes already punched in the side in case you want to keep them all together as your child completes them. I've chosen to leave them in the book for now, since my preschooler likes having it all in front of him and doesn't seem to move on until he has finished each activity. 

The front of the page has an activity with some simple directions. The back of the page is for the parent or educator and lists the objective(s) of the activity, theme, contents, suggested methodology, teaching and learning strategies, as well as additional activities that allow your child to dive deeper.

My preschooler is about to turn four and has just now discovered the joy of coloring, so introducing him to this book just happens to come at the perfect time. He loves this book as you can tell from the picture. The cover is already showing wear from him getting it out and plopping it open everywhere.

Here's a little peak at some of the pages:

And finally, the very last section of the book introduces English vocabulary and is intended, I believe, as an introduction to English as a second language. The instructions are still in Spanish for the parent, but the activities have English words. 

Overall, I think it is an excellent activity book for young children. And it is long lasting with more than 200 pages (100+ activities) for preschoolers to enjoy.

A Discount for YOU!

MommyMaestra readers can get a 30% discount on any order of Nacho Books. Just use this link and the discount code MommyMaestra at checkout.

El Gran Nacho: A Spanish Literacy Workbook

The following is sponsored post with Nacho Books. All thoughts and opinions are mine. 

Last month, I told you about Nacho Books' new website and that they had added new titles to their selection of books they sell. Today, I want to tell you about one of those titles that I think many of you will really like.

A Spanish Reading and Writing Master Activity Book

El Gran Nacho is 288 pages of literacy developing activities. It is definitely THE activity book to get to engage your kids during the summer or throughout the school year.

It's designed for children in the first grade. The book's introduction says that the exercises emphasize the following:

• stimulates the development of literacy skills: speaking, listening, reading, and writing
• exercises basic function such as visual perception, auditory skills, fine and gross motor skills
• and motivates children to follow the instructions of their teacher (you!), while helping them understand their leading role in the building of their own knowledge.

Okay, so what does this all mean? A LOT of experience and work has gone into creating this book.

It presents letters carefully; the most frequently used letters in the Spanish language are taught first. So naturally, the book begins by teaching the vowels and vowel sounds. The book teaches letters and words in a structured manner so that your kids can start building sentences.

Really, there's an entire process to how the alphabet, sounds, words, and language are taught in this book. And it's all backed by sound pedagogy.

But it's totally fun for kids. The illustrations are very well done, and the activities include things like tongue twisters, poetry, riddles, and crosswords. I even like how they mix print and cursive together to teach children how to read and write both.

I really love this book. And I think that you will, too.

Take a peek at some of the inside pages. Check out how they progress in difficulty...

If this looks like something you're looking for, click over to Nacho Books now and purchase your copy.

A Discount for YOU!

MommyMaestra readers can get a 30% discount on any order of Nacho Books. Just use this link and the discount code MommyMaestra at checkout.

New Website & Titles from Nacho Books

The following is sponsored post with Nacho Books. All thoughts and opinions are mine. 

Friends! I've been highlighting Nacho Books for a few years now because they are so well done and are hugely popular among the bilingual homeschool community. 

New Website

Well, I'm excited to share that they have just launched a brand new website! It's easier than ever to find their amazing products, including new ones such as the ones below.

Susaeta is a leading publisher of children's learning books throughout Latin America. In fact, I've heard from many homeschooling moms that they learned to read with Nacho books when they were kids in Venezuela, Colombia, and other Spanish-speaking countries. Their products have been really hard to find here in the United States, but thanks to Nacho Books, they are now available!

New Titles

The response has been so positive that Nacho Books has decided to expand the number of titles that they carry. They were kind enough to send me several for review, which I'll do over the next few months. 

The first two titles I want to highlight for those of you who are preparing to homeschool (again or for the first time) next year, are below.

Lecturas Integradas is ideal for emergent readers in 1st through 2nd grades. This book is packed full of stories that boost vocabulary, as well as comprehension questions to reinforce what they've read. The book still reviews the alphabet here and there simply to help students master it. But the focus is on reading and writing. 

Matemáticas A is best for students in 1st and 2nd grade (in my opinion). It begins with number recognition (1 - 100), quickly moves into double digit addition, and continues all the way through understanding how to interpret different types of graphs. 

These activity books should not be used as complete curricula (they don't teach how to do the various concepts), but rather they make excellent supplements as a fun way to practice in addition to their lessons. I think I would use these as activity books for car rides, on trips, or simply to pass the time at home.

If either of these sound like what you are looking for, go and check their website out! Or if you are looking for books in Spanish that teach concepts in grades PreK through 2nd grade, take a look at all the other titles on their website. 

A Discount for YOU!

MommyMaestra readers can get a 30% discount on any order of Nacho Books. Just use this link and the discount code MommyMaestra at checkout.

NACHO Lectura Inicial: A Spanish Reading Workbook

One of the requests that I get on a regular basis is for materials that teach children how to read in Spanish. I always refer parents to my FAQ page located in the top menu of this website. But I also have a page dedicated to Resources for Parents of Children Learning to Read in Spanish. And now, I have another wonderful resource to add to that list!

Last month, Sra. Jackie Amaya-García sent me a workbook that she says, "¡Es el libro con el que aprendimos todos en latinoamerica a leer!" And after looking through it, I believe her!

Take a look:

What are Nacho Books?

NACHO: Libro Inicial de Lectura is an awesome workbook printed in Colombia by SUSAETA ediciones. They publish a collection of (Spanish) reading and writing books for kids ages 4 - 13. This particular book is the first in the series, and helps beginning readers to master writing and reading by learning syllable combinations. The book is colorful and I love how even the text is in different colors to stress syllable learning, as well as individual letter sounds. (It sort of reminds me of Dick & Jane titles from my own childhood...but in Spanish!) Each page has a section at the bottom for copying sentences or to practice new reading skills.

I went to SUSAETA's website and gave a big whistle. I think some of you would let out a little "WEPA!" if you could see everything they have available.

BUT, you say, these are all the way in Colombia! How am I supposed to get my hands on these little tesoros?

Well, lucky for you, Cultural Bytes, a foreign language enrichment program out of Burbank, CA, is the rep for the US & Canada for this book and all titles from Susaeta. So you can purchase NACHO Inicial for only $16 + shipping.

But I wouldn't stop there. You can also find handwriting and spelling workbooks on Cultural Bytes' site.

And hey, if you live in California in or around the Burbank area, check out Cultural Bytes' summer Spanish camps. You can also find Sra. Jackie doing Spanish story time at a few Barnes & Nobles. Just visit their website for more information.

Other Posts You May Enjoy

• Resources for Parents of Children Learning to Read in Spanish
  
  
• First Readers in Spanish
  
  
• Chapter Books in Spanish
  
  
• Aula Creativa 5
  
  
• Nacho Aprende, Lee y Colorea

Disclosure: I was sent a copy of this book for review purposes. All thoughts and opinions are my own.