Language Learning Part 3: Flashcard Fun with Lil'ollo

Welcome to the third part of our Language Learning series: Flashcard fun with Lil'ollo, if you are joining us for the first time "Hello" or rather "Hallo"! We have previously looked at introducing languages through song and stories with an emphasis on learning German. However, the resources and products we have shared are available in many other languages too, so you may wish to take a look at our earlier posts: Language Learning Part 1: Singing with Lingotastic and Language Learning Part 2: STORIES.

Today's post is all about learning through play and we are delighted to be featuring some fun and versatile products from Lil'ollo. You may remember that we had been struggling to get hold of language resources in German and that was one of the reasons for starting the Language Learning mini series. A little while ago we stumbled across Lil'ollo and you can imagine our delight when we discovered that their beautiful range of flashcards come in many languages, including German! 

Although the focus today is on their flashcards, Lil'ollo offer a whole host of brilliant products for little language learners. Their online shop includes snap cards, posters, maps and even printables in German, Spanish, French, Italian, Polish, Welsh, Dutch, traditional and simplified Chinese. The printable products, which start from as little as £2.00, are an extremely affordable option if you are just starting out on your language learning journey. 

All the products have been designed to help incorporate new languages into everyday life, which is really important to Lil'ollo's founder Alex, who is raising her own children in a bilingual environment. However, whether you are raising children in a bilingual or multilingual family or simply introducing languages for a bit of fun, Lil'ollo's engaging products are perfect for encouraging little ones.

One of our favourite products is The Writable World Map, which would look great in any child's bedroom, nursery or playroom. It can be personalised to add places visited or to mark where different family member's live or originate from. It is such super idea for simply keeping track of your child's adventures or more importantly visualising their heritage.

You can take a peek at the full range of Lil'ollo's products here and if you like what you see, there is a discount code as well as a little giveaway at the end of this post. 

Writable World Map

Flashcard fun

We received four sets of German flashcards from Lil'ollo to review: Shapes, Colours, Animals and Numbers. Each set consists of 10 high quality printed cards in a printed drawstring bag. The friendly characters on the cards are simply delightful!

We first shared these products on Instagram in July so we have had a few months to work out how best to incorporate them into our play. We just love the versatility of the flashcards and wanted to share a few fun, yet simple, ways we use them to encourage language learning.

Over the next few weeks I'll be blogging about our language learning adventures and sharing some of our favourite resources. Do any of you learn languages with your little ones? #languagelearning #languages #languagestudy #littlelinguists #learningGerman #preschoollanguages #deutschlernen #pbloggersuk #pbloggers #foreignlanguages #kidsofig #instamum #minilinguists

A post shared by Kate (Along Came Poppy) (@kate.eccles) on Jul 5, 2017 at 2:17am PDT

Shape Match

We conveniently already had a wooden jigsaw puzzle to use for this game, but you could use any shaped items you have or even cut out some shapes from cardboard. We take it in turns to match a shape to the picture using the English and the German words. We talk about the characters on the cards and the colours as well as the shapes.

Shape Match

Pom Pom Counting

We have a mass of craft resources in our house including an incredibly large bag of pom poms, which is why this game came about. Here Mini Reviewer, Theo, is counting out the correct number of pom poms onto each number card. Using giant tweezers helps with his fine motor development and he thinks it is great fun.

Pom Pom Counting

More Pom Pom Counting!

Colour Treasure Hunt

We also tried using pom poms for colour sorting with the set of colour cards. This worked well until Mini Reviewer, Poppy decided to sit on them! Our favourite colours game is Colour Treasure Hunt. I lay out all the flashcards around the playroom, shout out a colour and the children have to grab something of that colour and place it on the correct card. Be warned this can get a little loud and rather chaotic!

Colour sorting or rather "sitting"!

Playdough Animals

We have only recently tried this activity but as the Mini Reviewers all love playdough, it was always going to be a winner! We used playdough cutters to make animals to match the 10 animals on the cards - cat, crocodile, rabbit, lion, giraffe, elephant, dog, mouse, bear, chicken. We talked about the different animals and repeated both the German and English names for the animals.

Tell me a story...

We are always exploring new ways to have fun with stories so this was inevitable. We use a mix of all the flashcard sets and take it in turns to pick up a card and add a little to the story. You can read all about our other storytelling ideas here.

READER DISCOUNT AND GIVEAWAY

We have been so impressed with Lil'ollo's products that we have become affiliates* and our readers can now save 10% on all Lil'ollo products when you use the code ALONGCAMEPOPPY at the checkout. You can see the full range of Lil'ollo's products here and if you want to keep up to date with all of Lil'ollo's news you can sign up to their club.

Until next time...

Kate & the Mini Reviewers xx

*Disclaimer: We were sent four sets of flashcards for the purpose of this review, all opinions are as always our own. This post contains affiliate links. Please note we are Lil'ollo affiliates and by using the code ALONGCAMEPOPPY, you save 10% and we receive a small amount per sale.