Category: German for Kids
-
Ingo Siegner’s Der Kleine Drache Kokosnuss is possibly the number-one most popular series among early elementary kids (as well as older preschoolers). There are 30+ books in this imaginative adventure series following two boy dragons, Kokosnuss and Oscar, and a girl porcupine, Matilda (Siegner’s website). Kokosnuss and his friends will get almost any child excited…
-
High quality video content is invaluable for minority language learning. Video input is nearly essential to grow fluency and vocabulary in young children when only one or two adults in the child’s life speak the target language. German-speaking families are especially lucky when seeking out high quality video inputs for their children, as German public…
-
If your preschooler is comfortable in German, you may be wondering which read aloud books will fully engage their interest and continue helping them enrich their vocabulary. Andreas H. Schmachtl is one of our favorite authors for young kids who speak German well. Schmachtl’s works are whimsical, funny and richly illustrated in watercolor. We love…
-
There are a few commonly discussed methodologies for raising bilingual children, and MANY more ways language-learning looks in everyday families around the world. In this article I’ll discuss some critical questions to think through if you are planning for the future or trying to address problems that are cropping up. First, a brief summary of…
-
You may be wondering why I put such a heavy emphasis on media on this site, rather than, say, parent-directed conversations. I have a PhD in Literature, so, yes, I do think reading is really, really fun, but I also know that media is a critical motivator for second-language acquisition. I’ve talked to many parents…
-
Constanze von Kitzing is the author and illustrator of lovely, modern children’s board books (author site). She is well known for her series about a diverse group of preschool children, who have adventures together with their teachers and parents. Von Kitzing’s Wimmelbücher are really sweet and humorous. Here’s an image from the first book in…
-
I’ve talked to a lot of parents who worry that their family constellation won’t be ‘enough’ to teach their kids a second language. Here are some examples of family situations like this — This can be a hot-button issue — so many resources will tell you that parents should speak their native language (and only…
-
The classic series Ich habe einen Freund, der bist… / Ich habe eine Freundin, die ist…, by Ralf Butschkow teaches children about diverse occupations. In each book, a child goes to work with a different person and learns about their career. They are nice, simple little stories where kids learn about everyday life as a…
-
Liane Schneider’s Conni series is one of the most famous children’s book series in German, and follow the everyday life and adventures of a young German girl named Conni. Since the first book was published in the early 1990s, the Conni world has expanded to over 100 stories across four different series, audiobooks, cartoons, movies,…
-
Wimmelbücher are picture books where the child looks for different things in a large picture (like Where’s Waldo) and they are extremely popular in Germany. The best Wimmelbücher to facilitate language learning include text that help give the child additional German language input. Here are some top Wimmelbücher series:
