My Cozie Corner: Lightening fast Spanish kids book review/giveaway

~Guest Post~
Thanks to Penny Pincher Jenny for the Review

I was absolutely thrilled to get the chance to review Lighting-Fast Spanish by Carolyn Woods!!! My husband is an immigrant to the US and came here over ten years ago from Peru. English is his second language and over the past six years of our marriage I have struggled to pick on speaking Spanish. I took spanish in high school and have learned to "understand" spoken spanish but speaking it has been beyond me!!! My mother in law lived with us fora couple months and people looked at us funny! I would speak in broken spanish and english she would speak spanish but we understood each other!!

One problem I have always had when trying to "Self teach" myself spanish or even in high school was the memorization!! I for the life of me can't do it! I want my children to know the language as well but hard to do that if only one person is speaking the spanish. What makes this book extremely unusual is the way it is set up to help learn Spanish in real life situations and as a family!!!

Our favorite part of the book was the "Time for Dinner" section. This is one thing the kids are always all together for and help do every day as a family. My oldest Kylie has always loved learning Spanish!! She remembers when her grandma from Peru was here and the language she spoke and that daddy speaks. The little ones didn't say the words but followed cues and seemed to understand (Both have speech delays so we aren't quite pushing spanish on them). I am pleased to say I have picked up a lot more of the basic words from doing the book with the kids!!

As well as doing the chapters there are several games. My children weren't interested in any game but the scavenger hunt. I think i should have introduced that game last as it's the most fun!!

Overall I highly recommend this book!! It opened up a new way to learn and introduce a language to my kids!! I have written in the book as Kylie and I have mastered the different words, what activities were our favorites, etc. The book is so slim it fits right in my purse we can take it on the go and Kylie will read the English parts as to what to do and try to say the words.

Be sure to check out all the books and products from Carol Woods on Amazon by going here or her blog for current updates here.

Questions for Carolyn Woods - author of:

Lightning-fast Spanish For Kids and Families

Lightning-fast French For Kids and Families

Lightning-fast German For Kids and Families

Lightning-fast Italian For Kids and Families

Lightning-fast Chinese For Kids and Families

Lightning-fast Japanese For Kids and Families

Lightning-fast Spanish Vocabulary Building Crossword Puzzles

Make Money From Home With A Children’s eBay Business

Q: What was your inspiration for writing the "Lightning-fast" language books?

A: Well, I've had a long time dream of being able to communicate in more than one language. I have purchased lots and lots of language learning products through the years, but unfortunately I've never really had the results I was looking for - I suspect because they weren't interactive, and I got bored working on it all by myself! Once I had children my dream changed to all of us being multi-lingual. The "vision" became very clear when I read a book called "Cross My Heart And Hope To Spy" by Ally Carter. In it the main character attends a private school which trains spies, and each night as they walk into the main hall for dinner a sign by the door flashes the language they are to use - i.e. "Chinese - Mandarin dialect". When I read it, I thought "That's it! I want us to be able to have a basic dinner conversation in a bunch of languages! Maybe we can even put a sign by our kitchen with the language of the day!" Now that I had a goal I went in search of materials.... and found... nothing! At least, nothing that seemed workable to me. The materials I found either seemed focused on adult, travel-related situations or had entertaining characters giving kids very basic vocabulary lists. So in the end I wrote down things I wished I knew how to say and had them translated - so we could read them to each other and speak Spanish! It worked well enough for us that I've now had it re-translated into 5 other languages.

Q: How did you find time to write your book?

A: This is a question I'm asked a lot! In fact when I finished up the original book and sent out a note to friends to see if any of them would beta test it for me, I got one email back that said, "When did you have time to do this? You still have 4 kids, right?" But it actually was one of those things that felt like I HAD to do it... I really wanted this information and couldn't find it so I just had to get it together myself! And based on the feedback so far it seems like there are lots of other moms who are looking for something like this as well, which is nice too... I'm glad it's helping other families as well!