One little picnic: name it, count it, sort it.

One outing, four small things

A picnic blanket, a ball, some ducks at the pond, a cup that happens to be pink. A toddler does not need a lesson here; they need a parent who names what they are already looking at.¹ This page gives you four free cards from the app to say along with the outing — three words and one question — and two tiny games that use what is already on the blanket. Hear each card in a native voice, print all four on one sheet, and leave the rest to the afternoon.

Four cards to hear first

Tap a card to hear the Spanish, then the English. Say it once yourself; your voice is the one your child learns from. Every card is in the permanent free set.

Print these four cards on one sheet — Spanish on top, English underneath, cut lines included, no account.

Name it: pelota

Wait for the ball to roll past, then say pelota — and ball if your home uses both languages. One word, said while your child is looking at the thing, beats ten words said at a card.¹ If they look up at you, that is the moment for the question: ¿Quieres jugar? Answer whatever comes back — a reach, a sound, a word — by rolling the ball.

Count it: four ducks

Ducks are the best counting objects in any park: they arrive one at a time and then hold still. Point to each one as you count — one, two, three, four — and say the last number again: four ducks. That last repeat is the part that teaches.² Then the word: pato.

Sort it: pink, and not pink

Pick one thing your child can see and sort by it. Pink is a good first rule: it is either there or it is not. Put the pink things on one corner of the blanket and everything else on another, naming the color as you go: rosa. Then mix them up and let your child try. Sorting by one visible property is the same move Their First Tidy makes with toys at home.³

At home, the same game continues with real things: a first tidy-up together walks through it with toys, and Their First Tidy turns it into forty gentle tidy-ups on a phone or tablet.

Keep it: one sheet

The picnic sheet prints the four cards above on one page with cut lines: pelota, pato, rosa and “¿Quieres jugar?”, Spanish on top and English underneath. Put them in the picnic bag. A paper card by the real thing does the same job as a screen, with no screen.

In the app

These four cards come from Their First Words, where the 75 free words and 35 free phrases are spoken by a woman and a man in each of eight languages. Spanish families usually go next to the 75 first Spanish words (the whole free set, by age, with every recording) or the full Spanish deck to print. The app adds the other 1,000+ words and 500+ phrases, favorites, and a gentle record of what your child has said.