Printable Halloween Coloring Pages for Kids with Little Pim

With Halloween around the corner, print out these free Little Pim Halloween Coloring pages for your little ones to color and display them around the house or on the fridge for a festive decoration. Share your kids’ creation with us on social media using #littlepim - we’d love to see them!

Halloween 2020 will be like no other and we hope everyone stays safe and continues to practice social distancing while celebrating safely at home or outdoors. What are some fun ways you and your little ones are celebrating Halloween?

Many communities have planned safe events for kids to celebrate and parade around in their costumes. For trick or treating, we’ve seen a few ideas from creating a slide or shoot to drop candy down for kids to creating pre-packaged goody bags to place on an outdoor table for kids to grab without touching others’ treats. PopSugar has some great ideas for fun Halloween celebrations at home.

We have a local bakery here that is selling festive Halloween cookie and cupcake decorating kits - what a fun idea for little ones to get creative and enjoy a special treat!

incorporate language learning and World Culture in your Halloween celebrations

You can also incorporate language learning in your Halloween celebrations. While coloring, review the color vocabulary in your target language. You can also review harvest vocabulary for words like pumpkin, apple, farm, farm animals, barn, corn, etc.

It’s also a good opportunity to introduce your child to International Halloween traditions Perhaps the most famous outside of the American holiday, Mexicans celebrate Dia de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, on November 1st and 2nd. It's a time for family and friends to remember departed loved ones. Day of the Dead bread, or "Pan de Muerto," is a quintessential dish made during Dia de los Muertos. Learn to make you own here.

We hope you have lots of fun this year with your kids and we look forward to seeing the creative ways families around the nation are celebrating safely. Happy Halloween!



Italian for Kids: Easy Calzone Recipe and Italian Food Vocabulary

Italian food is a big part of Italian cultural heritage. At the same time, pizza must be one of the most popular foods and, for sure, it’s one of the most consumed and kids love it! Traveling around the world, you can find pizza almost everywhere, as well as buy a slice of pizza at a street corner and in a luxury restaurant. La cucina Italiana (Italian cuisine) is also famous for flavorful pasta, lasagna, risotto, ossobuco, tiramisu, etc. These delicious preparations are just the tip of an iceberg in terms of all that this cuisine offers. Followed by these, the calzone rank pretty high in the popularity chart worldwide.

It is much like the stuffed version of pizza, with similar taste, flavors, and flexibility to choose (vegetarian, non-vegetarian, or vegan) filling as per your preferences. Over the years, people have experimented generously to figure out which food combination works best in this addictive preparation.

Typically, the calzone is stuffed with ham, vegetables, salami, or egg, and any of the cheese that melts well upon heating, such as mozzarella, parmesan, ricotta, etc. The most popular calzone filling comprises fresh tomatoes, mushrooms, differently colored bell peppers, fresh herbs, and shredded mozzarella. However, various regions might have a varying filling that is usually associated with the pizza toppings popular in that region. Like in the US, calzones are mostly stuffed with meats, a combination of cheeses- ricotta, parmesan, mozzarella, provolone, etc., and a few vegetables. Have your kids tried a calzone before? You can make them as a hand-pie for little ones with simply tomato sauce and mozzarella. It’s also a good chance to add secret veggies and protein to the filling for a balanced meal.

Other popular calzone fillings can include the combination of artichoke hearts, asparagus, differently colored bell peppers, broccoli, capers, eggplant, mushrooms, olives, onion, tomato, zucchini, cheese (Swiss, mozzarella, cheddar, ricotta, gruyere, goat, blue, etc.), and herbs (rosemary, basil, oregano, etc.).

Use a wok for stir-frying the filling ingredient, as you need to keep the crunchiness of vegetables intact while preparing the calzone filling. This is because the filling ingredients will be cooked again in the oven when the bread dough bakes. Find the best wok buying options here; you will be amazed by the best reviews and purchase guide mentions on this page.

So, now that you are better aware of what all can be used as a calzone filling search for the ingredients of your interest to make one for yourself today!

INGREDIENTS

  • 1 pizza dough (homemade or store-bought)

Impasto per pizza

  • 50g cottage cheese, small cubes

fiocchi di latte 

  • 1 small red onion, chopped

Cipolla rossa

  • 1 small red bell pepper, chopped

Peperone rosso

  • 1 small yellow bell pepper, chopped

Peperone giallo

  • 1 small capsicum, chopped

Capsicum

  • 1 small zucchini, chopped

Zucchine

  • ¼ cup mushrooms, chopped

Funghi

  • 1 large red ripe tomato, chopped

Pomodoro rosso maturo

  • ½ tablespoon fresh basil leaves, chopped

Basilico

  • ½ teaspoon dried oregano

Oregano

  • 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

Olio extravergine d'oliva

  • Salt, to taste

Sale

  • ¾ cup mozzarella, shredded

DIRECTIONS

1.      Preheat the oven to 225 degrees C and grease a baking tray with a few drops of oil.

2.      Heat olive oil in a pan and sauté onion until it turns pink in color.

3.      Stir in red bell pepper, yellow bell pepper, capsicum, zucchini, mushrooms, tomato, and cook it for 3-4 minutes.

4.      Season the vegetable mixture with salt, black pepper, oregano, and basil.

5.      Stir in cottage cheese to the vegetable mixture and turn off the heat.

6.      Roll the pizza dough into ¼ inch thick circle and cut out 3-4 equal-sized circles from it.

7.      Equally divide and put the cooked filling at the center of each dough rounds.

8.      Top the filling with an equal quantity of mozzarella cheese.

9.      Now, pull half of the unfilled dough over the filled half and seal edges of each dough round to get half-moon shaped calzone pockets. Repeat this process with the remaining dough and filling.

10.  Carefully transfer the calzones onto the prepared baking tray and bake them for about 15 minutes or until golden in color.

11.   Serve hot and enjoy!

Photo by Roberto Valdivia on Unsplash

6 Easy Multicultural Recipes to Make with Your Kids

One of the best ways to introduce culture and language into your home is through the kitchen. Everyone learns to love something that is the source of delicious meals and snacks. Whether your children are learning another language or just stretching their linguistic wings, cooking is the perfect time to explore the globe through language. 

Cook together and pick recipes from all over the world. Talk about the origin of recipes, why people cook the way they do in other cultures. Then name each ingredient in the language of the people who invented it. From toddlers to teenagers, cooking together is a great way to learn. Let's take a look at six multicultural recipes that are easy enough to cook with kids and will bring language to your kitchen.

Spanish: Soft and Crunchy Tacos

Everyone loves a delicious meal of tacos. Crunchy or soft, spicy or mild, tacos are the ultimate in hand food. Kids love tacos and most kids are crazy about taco night. Make it even more special by putting tacos together as a family and naming each ingredient in Spanish along the way.

Ingredients

  • Ground Beef

    • Carne molida

  • Seasoning

    • Condimento

  • Lettuce

    • Lechuga

  • Tomatoes

    • Tomates

  • Shredded Cheese

    • Queso rallado

  • Crunchy Taco Shells

    • Tacos crujientes

  • Flour or Corn Tortillas

    • Tortillas de harina o maiz

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 F

  2. Pan-fry the ground beef (or other meats) until browned and fully cooked.

  3. Chop lettuce and tomatoes

  4. Lay foil on a cookie sheet. Place crunchy shells and soft tortillas, line each with cheese along the fold.

  5. Place the sheet of shells and tortillas in the oven.

  6. Add taco seasoning and 1-2 tablespoons of water. Let the water cook down and infuse the meat with flavor.

  7. Remove the shells and tortillas, then distribute them onto plates. 

  8. Load each taco with meat, lettuce, tomatoes, and a sprinkle of cheese.



French: Mini Breakfast Quiche

quiche

Quiche is one of the most simple and delicious French recipes in your cookbook. It's really very simple: Quiche is an omelet pie. If you can make a delicious omelet with your kids (or just delicious scrambled eggs) then you can make a delicious quiche. Explain the strange name and explore the French names for each ingredient as you put them together.


Ingredients

  • Pastry Dough (optional)

    • Pate a patisserie

  • Eggs

    • Des oeufs

  • Milk

    • Lait

  • Cheese

    • Fromage

  • Diced Protein

    • Proteine en des 

    • Ham, Bacon, Feta, Tofu, Scallions, etc.

  • Chopped Vegetables

    • legumes haches 

    • Mushrooms, Spinach, Tomatoes, Onion, etc.

Directions

  1. Preheat the Oven to 350 F

  2. Grease a muffin pan and line each cup with pastry dough. This can be pie crust, premade dough, or croissant roll dough.

  3. Sprinkle in meat and vegetables into each cup

  4. Fill each cup with egg

  5. Top each cup with cheese

  6. Bake 25-30 minutes

 

German: Deviled Eggs - Gefüllte Eier

Deviled eggs are hard-boiled eggs with a creamy kick. In fact, most families don't realize that this Easter classic has deep roots with the German people. They have a unique name for the recipe and introduced sprinkling paprika onto egg-yolks mixed with mustard. If your kids love to make deviled eggs, turn this treat into an all-year recipe by practicing the german names for each ingredient.

Ingredients

  • Eggs

    • Eir

  • Mustard

    • Senf

  • Mayo

    • Mayonaise

  • Salt and Pepper

    • Salz und Pfeffer

  • Paprika

    • Paprika

  • Optional

    • Dill or Sweet Relish

    • Tartar Sauce

    • Sour Cream

    • Onions

Directions

  1. Hard-boil the eggs, give them an extra few minutes to boil quite-hard.

  2. Peel each egg and slice it in half, longwise.

  3. Scoop the hard yolk from each egg, carefully keeping the egg whites from breaking

  4. Mix the egg yolks with mustard, salt, pepper, and mayo or a mayo substitute. Mix additional ingredients if preferred

  5. Re-fill egg whites with deviled egg mixture

  6. Top with sprinkled paprika

 

Irish: Shepherd's Pie

Shepherd's pie is filling and nutritious in a way that only very practical traditional foods can be. Stacked with all the good things a meal needs in one dish, kids love shepherd's pie. You can't go wrong with beef, mashed potatoes, and cheese. Enjoy the traditional recipe and Irish names for ingredients or mix it up and look up the Irish words for anything you add.

Ingredients

  • Ground Beef

    • Mairteoil Talun

  • Peas, Carrots, and Corn

    • Pisaenna, Caireid, agus Corn

  • Onions

    • Oiniuin

  • Worcestershire Sauce

    • Anlann Worcestershire 

  • Seasoning

    • Seasue

  • Mashed Potatoes

    • Bruitin

  • Cheese

    • Cais

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 400 F

  2. Brown and break up ground beef in a pan

  3. Fry chopped vegetables with the beef. Add Worcestershire sauce and seasoning to taste.

  4. Load a casserole dish or muffin cups with beef-vegetable mixture

  5. Top casserole or cups with mashed potatoes

  6. Sprinkle with cheese

  7. Bake for 30 minutes

 

English: Hand Pies

hand pie recipe

Every culture has hand-held recipes and in the UK islands, the favorite is definitely hand-pies. For children practicing English, explore the names of pastry dough, and name the fruit in the filling. Talk about street vendors singing about their pies and how hand-pies are an important part of traditional life in both rural and city England.

Ingredients

  • Pastry Dough

  • Fruit Filling

  • Meat Filling

    • Cooked and minced

  • Butter

Directions

  1. Preheat Oven to 

  2. Shape dough into flat circles the size of a spread-out hand

  3. Add 2-3 tablespoons of filling to the center of each dough circle

  4. Fold each dough circle in half and press the edges together

  5. Brush the tops with butter, line pinched crusts with foil

  6. Bake for 20-30 minutes

 

Japanese: Sushi (Philadelphia) Rolls

sushi for kids

Sushi is the single most recognizable meal from Japan and something every kid can enjoy. Both a refined entree and a healthy finger-food, practice Japanese with your children while rolling your own sushi rolls.

Ingredients

  • Short Grain White Rice

    • Sushi to Gohan

  • Seaweed Sheets

    • Nori

  • Fresh Raw Salmon

    • Furesshusamon

  • Avocado

    • Abokado

  • Stick of Cream Cheese

    • Kruimuchizu

Directions

  1. Cook 2-3 cups of sticky white rice

  2. Slice thin strips of sushi-grade raw salmon

  3. Slice equally thin strips of avocado

  4. Lay out one sheet of nori seaweed on a bamboo rolling mat

  5. Distribute an even layer of sticky rice over the nori

  6. Lay salmon in a line down the center of your rice, same direction as your bamboo mat sticks are pointing

  7. Lay avocado in a line next to the salmon

7 Children's Books About Diversity

7 Children's Books About Diversity

There are different ways you can teach your children to respect and value other people regardless of their skin color, language, religious background, financial standing, and physical abilities. Children's books are among the most effective tools to engage with young children about diversity and other important issues. The following are seven children's books that are great at teaching children about diversity:

9 Fun Summer Activities for Kids That Incorporate Language Learning

 9 Fun Summer Activities for Kids That Incorporate Language Learning

For most kids (and some adults) summer means one thing: fun! Whether your family is going on a road trip or making sandcastles on the beach, summer offers some great opportunities for family time — and you may be able to sneak some language learning into your activities with the kiddos!

Here are 9 fun summer activities that you can do with your kids that incorporate language learning. Feel free to add your own spin to each one!

Fun Fourth of July 2020 Activities for Kids

It’s hard to believe that the 4th of July is this weekend! 2020 has been quite the year so far. We hope you are all doing well and staying safe during these challenging times. With summer in full swing and another holiday coming up, you may need more fun activities to do with your little ones. Here are some fun activities to keep your little ones busy at home while enjoying the festivities.

Fourth of July Coloring Page

Print out this free festive coloring page with Little Pim celebrating the 4th of July! Setup your kids with crayons or markers and hang the finished artwork as decoration for the weekend’s festivities. Share with all the kiddos to help keep them entertained (at least for a few minutes).

Kids Art

Feeling a bit more creative? Check out this fun project using salt and watercolor paint to create a fireworks painting from Busy Mommy Media. It’s actually fairly easy and only requires a few materials you probably already have in your home: table sale, paper (black works best), watercolors, brushes, white glue, and a cookie sheet. Visit their website for step-by-step instructions.

Festive Recipes

fourth-of-july-skewers.png

I don’t know about your little ones, but my toddler loves helping me in the kitchen and she absolutely loves all fruits. Last year, we created festive 4th of July fruit skewers with fresh strawberries, banana slices, and blueberries. We went strawberry picking in CT a few days ago and have a surplus of fresh berries to use. Make the flag design with the fruit, but be careful with the sharp ends of the skewers.

We also found some great recipes via the Food Network this year that the little ones can help with, especially when it comes to decorating cakes and desserts!

DIY 4th of July Slime

This can be a messy, yet fun activity to do with your little ones. We recommend doing this activity outside so clean up will be a breeze! This recipe is fun and safe for kids as it doesn’t use Borax and you can color them red and blue, perfect for the 4th of July!

What you’ll need:

  • Plastic bowls

  • Water

  • Cornstarch

  • Food coloring (Red and Blue)

In a bowl, combine 1 cup of cornstarch and 1 cup of water. Mix until you have a good and slimy mixture.

Add 1 to 3 drops of food coloring.

Repeat with other colors.

Then play away.

We hope you all have a great and safe holiday weekend. Be sure to incorporate Little Pim and language learning in your family summer fun! You can have your little language learners name each color in a different language when making crafts or recite the names of the fruits in their second language when prepping summer treats in the kitchen. If you’re traveling this holiday weekend, you can take Little Pim with you with our free video player app for iOS and Android. Happy Independence Day, America!

6 Tips for Teaching Korean to Toddlers

6 Tips for Teaching Korean to Toddlers

There are several benefits to being bilingual or multilingual. It's an opportunity to think and solve problems in different languages, improve social skills by speaking different languages, and grow cognitive muscles. While all these benefits are amazing, they may not be visible to a young child. Teaching your toddler Korean is daunting, especially if you're a beginner, but it's possible. As a parent, providing guidance can improve your child's ability to learn a new language. Here are a few tips for teaching Korean to toddlers…

6 Fun Earth Day 2020 Activities for Kids

6 Fun Earth Day 2020 Activities for Kids

Staying home with kids can be fun. We bet after a few weeks of unplanned confinement, you have doubts.

You are stuck at home with your active and inquisitive two (three, four, five, six, take your pick)-year-old or (oh, no!) a few of them. The ideas of fun things to do are running out at the speed of light. Is it time to panic?

Not at all! With Earth Day coming up, we've created a list of fun activities to help you take the mandatory isolation in stride. Your kids will love every minute, helping you relax along the way.

Parent and Teacher Guide on How to Use Little Pim

language-learning-toddlers.png

First of all, congratulations on choosing the most effective method for introducing babies, toddlers, and pre-schoolers to a second or third language at the time they learn best. The foreign language learning series is specially designed to take advantage of the critical window when young minds are hard-wired to learn up to three languages with ease, which is up to six years old.

This parent and teacher guide includes information and tips so you can become your child’s first language tutor even if you don’t speak the language yourself. You can find full scripts for each language here.

The Little Pim series stars an animated panda bear named Little Pim who is also the teacher. Using our unique Entertainment Immersion Method™, Little Pim makes learning easy and fun. The videos combine live-action segments showing children eating, playing and engaging in everyday activities, along with the adorable animation of Little Pim the panda. The entire series is in the foreign language for total immersion, with optional subtitles.

We are always eager to hear from parents, teachers, or caregivers about their experience with our program. You can email us at info@littlepim.com. Thank you for choosing Little Pim for your little learner.

- Julia Pimsleur, Founder of Little Pim

Each Little Pim theme is broken up into seven short episodes. Because we know babies and toddlers have short attention spans, Little Pim was designed to allow you to start and stop after any of the five-minute episodes. Older children (2-6) may enjoy watching the seven short episodes in one sitting. You can pause the episodes at any time and interact with your child to help reinforce the new vocabulary.

Below are some tips on how to use Little Pim effectively at home:

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Why should my child learn a foreign language?

There are numerous benefits to learning a second language early in life. Children who are consistently exposed from a very young age to the sounds of a foreign language are more likely to achieve native or near-native fluency in adulthood and have a much easier time learning other languages later in life. Research shows that these children also tend to have stronger verbal, cognitive and analytical skills – giving them a head start in school. Simply put, learning a second language boosts brainpower, even if the child does not achieve total fluency

Will my child be confused?

Children are uniquely equipped to learn up to three languages without affecting their progress in their mother tongues. Countless people grow up in multilingual environments: for example, many Swiss, Belgians, Canadians and Africans learn two or even three languages from birth. In the first half of the 20th century, the prevailing view was that bilingualism and second-language acquisition early in life confused children and interfered with their ability to develop normal cognitive functions and succeed in educational environments. These ideas were reversed in a landmark study by Peal and Lambert that showed a general superiority of bilinguals over monolinguals in a wide range of intelligence tests and aspects of school achievement. Please refer to our books on page six to learn more about the many benefits of studying a second language at a young age.

What if I don’t speak any foreign languages?

The Little Pim series can be enjoyed and used by adults with no prior experience in speaking a foreign language. Although adults will not have as easy a time repeating the vocabulary as young children, they too will be amazed at how quickly they pick up a few new words. There are also aids built-in for adults: optional subtitles in English, writing on the screen, and a free downloadable script for each language on our website.

THE RESEARCH

Language Exposure At An Early Age

Study after study shows that from birth to age six, the human brain is optimally equipped for learning and producing language. Little Pim was specifically created for young children to be able to take full advantage of this window for learning.

Babies hear their mothers’ voices before birth and know the rhythm of their native language as newborns. Once born, babies can understand and discriminate the sounds of every language in the world. Infants detect different sounds and hear the nuances in foreign languages with perfect clarity and precision. The sound elements of language are called phonemes, and repeated studies show that adults perceive phonemes differently than infants.

Screen Shot 2020-03-31 at 3.20.30 PM.png

Young children’s ways of assimilating language are distinctly different from adults, especially in pronunciation. As children become “tuned” to their native language (or languages), they gradually lose the ability to tell the subtle sounds in foreign languages apart. When people are introduced to foreign sounds later in life, they have much more difficulty hearing the differences, thus making it that much harder to imitate these sounds.

Babies gain understanding long before they can speak and benefit from having a rich language environment. That is because babies learn to talk by listening. Research tells us that the more words babies hear, the more quickly they learn to talk. Frequent exposure to words and active social engagement helps the brain pathways that foster language learning to develop more fully.

Children need to hear language in relation to what is happening around them. It must capture the child’s attention, thus the “motherese” - speech with rising and exaggerated contours - is very effective when speaking to one’s baby or toddler. In addition, surrounding children with language materials such as books, objects, and pictures for naming help to support language learning. Little Pim’s voice mirrors “motherese” and the series uses sharp and colorful images of objects and actions, allowing young viewers to connect the sounds they hear with actions and objects in real life.

Little Pim makes it easy and fun for parents to take advantage of the best window of opportunity for successful foreign language learning and give them all the cognitive benefits of being multilingual.

How to Start Introducing Foreign Languages into Your Child’s Life

How to Start Introducing Foreign Languages into Your Child’s Life

It’s common knowledge that the earlier you can start teaching and incorporating language into your child’s life, the easiest it will be for them to learn and the more benefits they’ll get out of the experience; both in terms of enhancing their learning capabilities and for being more cultured and diverse when they’re older.

However, whether you speak multiple languages yourself or just speak the one, introducing the ideas of learning a new language can be hard work and requires consistency and perseverance. In today’s guide, we’re going to detail everything you need to know to get started.