First Spanish words for toddlers: 75 to start with.

Start with what they can see

Across languages, a toddler’s first ten words look alike: the people who look after them, animals and the sounds they make, food, and a few greetings and routines.¹ “Mamá”, “leche”, “perro” and “adiós” come long before “azul” or “tres”. So the first Spanish words worth teaching are not a colour chart or the alphabet; they are the nouns of an ordinary day, said at the moment the child is looking at the thing.

If your family is adding Spanish to English, count both. Bilingual toddlers reach the same milestones on the same schedule when their vocabulary is counted across both languages together, and a child who says “milk” at breakfast and “leche” at dinner has two words, not one.^{2, 3} The bilingual toddler guide has the studies.

How to say them

Spanish is kinder to beginners than English is. Five vowels, each with one sound, always: a as in “father”, e as in “bed”, i as in “machine”, o as in “more”, u as in “rule”. A few things trip English speakers up:

• The accent mark tells you where to push. mamá and papá stress the last syllable; plátano stresses the first. Without a mark, words ending in a vowel, n or s stress the second-to-last syllable: pe-LO-ta, za-PA-to.
• ñ is the “ny” in “canyon”: montaña, niño.
• rr is rolled: perro, carro, arcoíris. A quick tap of the tongue is fine; your child will copy the recording, not you.
• h is silent and, in Latin American Spanish, z and soft c sound like s: zapato starts with “sa”, cocina is “co-SEE-na”.

The words below are in the Latin American Spanish most families in the United States hear. A family from Spain will say coche for carro and gafas de sol for lentes de sol; a child who learns one will understand the other. Adjectives change their ending for a girl or a boy, so emocionado becomes emocionada, and científica on the card has a brother, científico.

The 75 words

These are the free words from Their First Words in Spanish, in the three stages the app uses. Every word is recorded by a native speaker, a woman and a man; tap to hear it, then say it yourself. The same 75, plus 35 everyday phrases, are also free printable Spanish flashcards with the English underneath.

First Words 0–24 months · 25 words

Growing Words 2–3 years · 25 words

Word Builder 3–5 years · 25 words

Using them in an ordinary day

A toddler learns a word from a person, in the moment the thing is in front of them, said more than once. Nothing on this page replaces that; it only hands you the word. Pick a routine and keep the Spanish to it for a week:

• Breakfast: leche, plátano, cuchara, and más, por favor when the bowl is empty. The mealtime guide walks through exactly this.
• Getting dressed: zapato, mano, and listo when the shoe is on.
• The park: árbol, flor, perro, pelota, saltar.
• Bedtime: osito de peluche, abrazar, te quiero.

Name what your child is already looking at, not what you want them to look at; wait a few seconds after you say it; and treat a point, a sound or an English word as a correct answer, then say the Spanish again.⁴ If you use two languages at home and want one calm way to do it with cards, the two-language card routine is five minutes a day.

Paper, app, or both

The printable cards are free, no sign-up, and work with no screen at all; print them, cut on the lines, and keep five on the fridge. The app is free to start with these same 75 words and 35 phrases, and adds the two native voices, favourites and offline play; one payment opens the rest of the 1,000+ words and 500+ phrases. Either way, the learning happens in your voice.