Our Favorite Spanish Cartoons and Children's Shows for the Littlest Learners

(1) Little Baby Bum

While technically not a show, Little Baby Bum en Español has a YouTube channel (linked here) with cartoons that accompany classic nursery rhymes and songs in Spanish. You can find individual songs or longer song compilations like this one which contains an hour of songs including Old McDonald, Wheels on the Bus, Itsy Bitsy Spider, Mary Had Little Lamb and many more. Since these videos are on YouTube you can slow them down to 75% for faster songs when your child is first learning Spanish. For early learners, I especially love that they have songs that teach fundamental vocabulary such as shapes, colors, numbers and animals - a few of which I've linked below:

• El tren de colores (colors)

• La Canción de los Colores del Arco Iris (colors)

• El Tren de las Formas (shapes)

• La Canción de las Formas (shapes)

• La Canción del Uno al Veinte (numbers )

• La Canción del 1 al 10 (numbers)

• El Viejo McDonald Tiene una Granja (animals)

• La Canción de los Sonidos de los Animales (animals)

(2) La Casa de Mickey

The Spanish equivalent of Mickey Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, La Casa de Mickey features all the same characters, songs, and recurring segments (like Oh Toodles!) as its English counterpart. I love La Casa de Mickey because Mickey regularly talks to his viewers and encourages them to respond. The show is also aimed at education, so many episodes go over fundamental vocabulary such as colors, numbers and shapes. This is a show where you should definitely watch along with your child and encourage them to respond to Mickey or participate when the characters are counting or identifying colors and shapes. If you are not a Spanish-speaker, turn on the subtitles so you can learn too!

The only downside to La Casa de Mickey is the characters speak pretty fast. That combined with their silly voices can make them hard to understand. This a show that I strongly prefer to watch on YouTube so I can slow the video speed to 75% which makes the characters a lot easier to understand.

(3)Nina Tiene Que Ir

If you have never seen the shows English counter-part "Nina Needs to Go," this is a series of shorts so the episodes are only about three minutes each. The series revolves around little girl, Nina, who has to use the bathroom at inopportune times. I love this show because the characters speak very clearly, it has repeating elements and phrases. Each show also revolves around a family outing, such as a road trip, camping trip, beach trip, wedding, zoo trip, etc., which makes the vocabulary and themes very straight forward. I usually find this show on YouTube and slow down the video speed to 75%, but I am occasionally able to find it through our cable provider's OnDemand feature in the Spanish section.

(4) Sésamo (or Plaza Sésamo)

The Spanish version of Sesame Street, I am often able to find this through my cable's OnDemand feature in the Spanish section or there are quite a few episodes and shorts available on the YouTube Channel: Sésamo. Again, the benefit to using YouTube is you can slow the video speed down to 75% to make the characters easier to understand.

For early learners, I prefer to watch the video shorts on the YouTube channel instead of the full episodes because the shorts are usually themed so they use a lot of vocabulary based around that theme which makes them easier to understand for children who don't know much Spanish. The YouTube channel cycles out videos pretty regularly, so I haven't linked any here but definitely head on over to the page and see what's available. If you click the "Video" tab on the channel's home page it will take you to all of the available videos. The preview picture of each video indicates which category the video falls in such as Aprende (Learn), Leyendo Juntos (Reading Together) or Listos a Jugar (Ready to Play), among others.

(5)Perro y Gato

There are a limited number of episodes available through HBO Go/Now/On Demand, but there are many more available on YouTube. The main characters of the show, a dog and a cat, speak both English and Spanish. Each episode is themed and Perro y Gato introduce vocabulary based on that episode's theme. It's a great bilingual option for those who don't speak much Spanish.

Other Tips and Tricks -

Above all find a show your child likes to watch because if they don't like it in English, they really won't like it in Spanish. Also be aware of your child's ability level - meaning, find shows that you know are going to use some of the vocabulary they already know. It is nearly impossible to pick up anything from Spanish television if you have no baseline vocabulary. For more on this see my post on using videos to teach your child Spanish (linked here).

When we first started watching television in Spanish, we began with educational video shorts, songs and nursery rhymes. As my daughter got more comfortable, we moved on to La Casa de Mickey and other shows with themed episodes that used the vocabulary words over and over in each episode. For older children with a better understanding of Spanish, Netflix is a great resource. They have a ton of children's movies and shows available in Spanish, you just have to switch the language over to Spanish by clicking the audio/caption bubble in the bottom right hand corner of the screen and switching the audio to Spanish.