I’m a HUGE podcast listener, and love to turn one on while in the car or at home doing housey things. Now that my kids are old enough to appreciate podcasts themselves, I’ve become very invested in finding the Spanish podcasts for kids! 

I like to turn these on while we’re all in the car— especially during long road trips, but also when we’re doing school drop-offs or errands (although lately my kids demand the Encanto soundtrack every time we’re in the car, soooo…). Podcasts are also PERFECT for quiet time, since the kids can play with Magnatiles or Legos or paint or do other quiet things while they listen. 

And, confession? I have also been known to put on a podcast during dinner when my husband Josh is out of town and I’m really tired and just need everyone to eat and let me eat in mostly-silence. Magic! 

Below is my list of the best Spanish podcasts for kids, divided by type of podcast! Pretty much all of them are best for kids with a solid level of Spanish, but I did find a couple that are perfect for Spanish learners. 

Podcasts are such an amazing way to boost kids’ exposure to Spanish, so don’t sleep on these great options! 

PODCASTS FOR SPANISH LEARNERS

I will confess right now that this is one podcast we haven’t listened to, but that’s because it’s aimed specifically at Spanish learners who are beginners. I’ve heard wonderful things about it though! I sampled a couple of episodes so I could write this little summary, and the audio is mostly English, introducing small bits of Spanish vocab through music and games. I think this is an AMAZING option for kids who are just starting with español! So far, there are two full seasons, with more episodes currently in production. 

Spanish stories for kids

On Apple Podcasts

Level: Intermediate – advanced

This podcast could technically also be under the category of classic stories and fairytales. However, because the audio is very clear and spoken more slowly than lots of other podcasts, I think it would be great for Spanish learners who are pretty advanced but not quite 100% fluent. Each episode is 10ish minutes long, and the episodes are introduced in English by the storyteller’s son (who also gives vocabulary words to listen for throughout the episode, and reviews them afterward). 

CLASSIC STORY / FAIRYTALE PODCASTS

Cuentos encantados

On Apple Podcasts | on Spotify

Level: Intermediate – advanced

My kids love listening to this podcast! And I am also a big fan of these “magical stories,” which include many traditional fairy tales (Hansel and Gretel, the Princess and the Pea), and also plenty of stories I had never heard before. Looks like they stopped recording in 2020, but the good news is that there are 50 episodes! Each episode is short-ish (between 10-15 minutes long), so we blew through them pretty quickly and are on Round II of listening. The narrator has a definite Spanish accent (as in, from Spain), which I thought was fun for my little mexicanitas to become familiar with. 

Cuento Aventuras

On Apple Podcasts

Level: Advanced

This podcast has been around for a while, so even though the last episode produced was in 2020, there’s quite a backlog of episodes to enjoy! The podcast itself includes stories, fables, and jokes for kids to listen to in Spanish. As for the stories, it’s everything from classic Aesop’s fables to traditional fairy tales and even some made-up stories by podcaster Gastón Morineau. This one feels a little more like a radio show than some of the others, because the podcaster will often give shout-outs to listeners that write or call in! 

Érase una vez: Cuentos infantiles

On Spotify

Level: Advanced

This is another great collection of stories! The podcast also features beautiful music and high quality audio, as well as shout-outs to kid listeners that leave voicemails at the beginning. The podcast started off with a season of “spooky stories” about a little ghost, which I’m saving for the kids to listen to next October I think.

READ-ALOUD PODCASTS

Puro cuento 

On Spotify

Level: Advanced

This is a fun children’s book-based podcast with high-quality music. It’s a great one for short car rides, because the stories are on the shorter side (between about 3-10 minutes). This podcast features several books that we’ve read before, but even more that we haven’t! I LOVE this podcast because I’ve read a lot about the amazing benefits for kids of listening to audiobooks (here’s one study, por ejemplo), but of course it’s kind of tricky to find audiobooks in Spanish. The last episode was produced in 2020, but hopefully they come back and if not, there’s a good backlog! 

¿Me lees un cuento?

On Spotify

Level: Intermediate – advanced

This podcast is created by the Spanish publishing house Editorial Hola Monstruo, and is based on read-alouds of their books. The hosts Mariela, Alexandra and Israel recommend books they love, as well as movies for the whole family. Some episodes are read-alouds, while others are retellings of their favorite movies. This is a podcast with longer episodes (10-30 minutes usually) and the format is basically parents reading aloud a book to their child (with a lot of child participation/response). 

Hoy quiero contarles 

On Spotify

Level: Intermediate – advanced

Listening to this podcast kind of feels like listening to a children’s book on CD (or… whatever people use these days instead of CDs). And that’s because dominicana writer and storyteller Anya Damirón loosely reads us her favorite books (she doesn’t stick exactly to the text). This one has a lot of music and sound effects throughout, which makes it very engaging and perfect for younger kids especially.

THEMED PODCASTS

Allegro Mágico

On Apple Podcasts | on Spotify

Level: Advanced

I think this podcast is so wonderful! Allegro Mágico is a podcast created by a mamá mexicana who wanted her daughters to learn about classical music. Some episodes are a deep dive into a composer (Tchaikovsky, for example), while others feature stories accompanied by classical music or simply famous classical music pieces. I have to admit that my younger daughters aren’t quite as captivated by some of these episodes as I am (maybe because they do feature longer segments of classical music in between the story/talking); perhaps best for older listeners or to have on in the background while younger kids play or do other things. The music is so beautiful! Episodes are 10-20 minutes long.

Brains On en Español 

On Apple Podcasts | on Spotify

Level: Advanced (best for kids ages 7-11)

This podcast sadly only has 7 episodes, but I was so excited to find it for my insatiably curious 7-year-old. Host Molly Bloom and a child co-host (the kids have varying levels of Spanish, la verdad) find the answers to some of life’s most interesting questions in each 30 minute science-based episode. This podcast is a translation of the English version, and sadly it looks like the project didn’t get very far, but this is still a nice little series for an older kid. 

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P.S. Listening to the best Spanish podcasts for kids is definitely one of them, but here are more easy ways to add Spanish to the daily routine! 

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2020 is the year this sentence became normal: “How are your kids going back to school this year?” 

So many options we never even considered before! Virtual, in-person, hybrid and… homeschool. We chose that last option and are embarking on a bilingual homeschool journey (which is a sentence I never—¡NUNCA!—thought I’d write!). 

I am clearly not a homeschooling expert since this is my first year doing it, but I always find it interesting to know what has been helping other families (I’m a fan of “life/mom-hacks”). In this post I thought I’d share some things we’re using to make bilingual homeschool work! I think a lot of these can also work as a supplement to any kind of schooling, whether that’s virtual or hybrid or good, old-fashioned regular school. 

For reference my kids are quite little (5, 3, and 1), so homeschooling this year looks like teaching a kindergartener and a preschooler while managing a toddler.

FOR MY KINDERGARTENER:

KiwiCo: First on the list is this amaaazing subscription service for science and art projects to help us out with STEM (not my strong suit). I’ve heard great things about KiwiCo for MONTHS, and homeschooling was the perfect excuse to subscribe for my older girls. I signed each kid up for her own (Kiwi Crate for my 5-year-old, Koala Crate for my 3-year-old), and they’re both just ecstatic to have their own little happy mail! And I really love that these boxes help my kids work on problem-solving & STEM skills (and make me feel like I’m the kind of mom who regularly shops for and preps kid crafts because… I am not). You can get 30% off your first month’s order with code SHARE30!

Countdown timer: I’m so happy with this little thing! This timer has made a big difference in my kids’ ability to manage their own time (whether that’s “You have 10 minutes to clean up and get ready” or “You have about 25 minutes until you need to be on a Zoom call”). Plus it’s so happy (yellow!) and it’s also teaching them to count by 5’s!

Libros de Texto Secretaría de Educación Pública: I had a hard time finding homeschool resources in Spanish for native speakers, so I decided just to use the books that kids use in school in Mexico. Luckily you can find them for free online (though I’m still trying to track down physical copies). They’re not perfect since they’re meant to be used in a classroom setting, but they’re good enough for now.  

The Good and the Beautiful curriculum: I saw this homeschool curriculum recommended all over the place when I was trying to figure out what I needed for this year. We’re using it for both math and (English) language arts, and I’ve been really happy with it! It’s “open and go,” meaning I don’t need to do any prep work beforehand, it’s relatively light on the worksheets, and plenty of the activities are more play-based. 

Hoffman Academy + Virtual Ballet: We have moved extracurricular activities online for the time being (though very much looking forward to doing in-person classes again when we can!). Hija mayor has been learning piano with Hoffman Academy for about a year now! And both girls take ballet via Zoom from a teacher in Querétaro, MX. I was skeptical about doing a ballet class online, but one nice perk is that it’s in Spanish (always looking for more Spanish exposure!). They do pretty well, considering, and they’re always happy to see the teacher and other little kids even if it’s just through the screen. 

FOR MY PRESCHOOLER:

There’s a lot of overlap between the two, since I’m often doing Kindergarten homeschool with all three kids and I just try to adapt the lessons to be 3-year-old friendly. But I wanted to share a couple of resources specifically for preschoolers that I think are amazing! 

Pre-K Spanish Digital Bundle: My friend Corrie from Mama Llama Linguist just came out with this amazing Spanish Morning Binder for bilingual preschoolers! You can grab it for over 130 nature-themed printables, with 26 units on things like the alphabet, early math and number tracing, phonics, shapes & colors. This one is also no-prep (besides printing out the materials) which I appreciate soooo much! Pro-tip: you can put these sheets in dry-erase pocket sleeves and reuse them!

LinguaLearner: My OTHER friend Briana and her sister created this bilingual Spanish/English preschool curriculum that sends subscribers 8 easy-to-follow bilingual lessons each month. You get the list of materials to purchase, literature recommendations to go along with the lesson, and the lesson plan + handouts to print out. It’s really well-done, research based, and very affordable at about $10 per month and only $99 for the whole year! They also have some free printables if you want to try those first!

Note: If you buy something through these links, I may earn an affiliate commission, at no cost to you. I only recommend products I genuinely like! ¡Gracias por leerme!

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For the past few days I’ve found myself in an organizing frenzy: cleaning out my closet! making chore charts for the girls! creating a system to deal with all the papers that come back from school! etc. 

I was a little mystified by this sudden motivation to improve everything until I remembered: September. We’re in September now, aka “the other January,” so of course I was all about creating new systems for our daily routine and trying to get organized. 

And while I was thinking of new routines and new systems to implement, it occurred to me that this back-to-school time is also the perfect moment to add a little something else to new daily routines: E S P A Ñ O L! 

So if you feel like perhaps you haven’t been speaking as much Spanish to your kids as you’d like to, this post is for you. All of these strategies are simple because let’s be real, things are only going to get busier from now until the holidays. But I truly believe that even a little bit of Spanish is absolutely better than no Spanish at all.  

HOW TO ADD SPANISH TO YOUR DAILY ROUTINE

Write a little note in Spanish, stick it in the lunch box. Do you do lunchbox notes? If so, try doing a few a week (or all of them) en español for a sweet way to practice reading in Spanish.

Say a prayer/affirmations in Spanish. For praying folks, praying with your kids in Spanish is a really good way to talk about things they did that day or are thankful for in Spanish— hello, vocabulary building! (Giant disclaimer: obviously in this case language acquisition is completely secondary to spiritual communion, but you have to admit it’s a nice perk.) And if you’re not the praying sort, doing daily affirmations in Spanish with your kids could accomplish the same thing (in addition to being completely adorable). 

Spanish at bedtime. Of course reading in Spanish was going to make its way on this list somehow :). If you aren’t already reading in Spanish during the day, the bedtime story is a natural time to do so! And if you happen to sing at bedtime, might I suggest choosing a Spanish lullaby?

Spanish music in the morning. And speaking of singing, why not greet the day with some tunes en español! I’m partial to salsa music during the morning rush because I don’t drink caffeine and need all the energy I can get, but you could also try Spanish kids tunes as you’re making sure everyone has breakfast and locates shoes.

Spanish in the car. If you happen to drive your kids to and from school, that time in the car is perfect to listen to an audiobook or kids’ podcast in Spanish. I’m always on the hunt for great ones, but a good place to start is Ven con un cuento on Spotify (though I really wish there were more episodes!). I’m planning on doing a roundup of the best audiobooks and podcasts for kids in Spanish, so stay tuned for that if you need some suggestions. 

If you can think of other easy ways to add some Spanish to your family’s daily routine, leave a comment here!

P.S. While we’re on the subject: some of my favorite Spanish picture books for back to school!

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If you’re raising a bilingual kid here in the U.S., no doubt you’ve experienced this issue (or will at some point): your child all of a sudden refuses to speak Spanish.

Agh! The frustration! The confusion! Do you try to force it? Do you pretend you don’t understand English? Do you just carry on and ignore it? Have you done all of these things, like I have? 🙂

I anticipate that this could be something we experience more and more with our kids, though luckily so far it hasn’t happened tooooo often. But the other day, while casually googling “my child won’t speak Spanish” (as one does, haha), I found the most brilliant analogy that I just had to share here.

It comes from the research of Dr. Sabine Little, who works with bilingual families to see how they negotiate language policies at home. She thinks of the home language/minority language (Spanish in our case) as “Great Aunt Edna’s Vase.”

Imagine that Great Aunt Edna passes on and leaves her treasured vase to her nephew. All kinds of things could happen, right? The nephew could have exactly the same taste and love her vase because he finds it beautiful. He also could think the vase is rather hideous, but keep it because it reminds him of how much he loved Great Aunt Edna. Orrr he might not care too much for either the vase OR Great Aunt Edna, so he stuffs it in a corner somewhere and lets it gather dust. Finally, he may think it’s so atrocious that he gives it away immediately and never thinks about it again.

And that’s without taking into consideration what other family members might think and express about the florero!

So the moral of the story is that this inherited gift can be a source of pride, conflict, guilt, love or disregard. And that’s just a vase! Imagine how complicated feelings can get when the inheritance is not an object, but a language!

I’m working on a follow-up post with specific strategies on what you can actually DO when your kids won’t speak Spanish, but I thought this research was so interesting! Dr. Little found that parents often fail to talk with their kids about any complicated feelings regarding their bilingualism, which means that language could easily turn into a battleground for the family. I know I’ve seen that happen.

Now that we’re a year away from our four year old starting kindergarten and officially switching from a mostly-Spanish day to a mostly-English day, I’m trying to prepare for this elementary school phase that Dr. Little calls “a common point of linguistic rebellion.” Her best advice? Keep renegotiating language choice with children as they grow up, and talk as much ABOUT language choice and the home language as IN the home language.  

I’d love to hear from you, what has worked in your family (or hasn’t worked at all?). For us, pretending we don’t speak English wasn’t an option because hello, our kids are no dummies. My best strategy so far has been either asking a question in Spanish to gently remind everyone what we’re speaking (“Mommy, I did a puzzle today at school!” “Ah, ¿y de que era el rompecabezas?”) or just straight-up saying “En Español, por favor” if my more subtle approach isn’t working.

Let me know in the comments what you do, and if you found the vase analogy as amazing as I did!

(Photo of the vase by @evelyntannus on Instagram.)

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