If you are a CM homeschooling family you know how important Foreign Language Studies were for Ms. Mason:
"The daily French lesson is that which should not be omitted. The children should learn French orally, by listening to and repeating French words and phrases; that they should begin so young that the difference of accent does not strike them, but they repeat the new French word all the same as if it were English and use it as freely; that they should learn a few–two or three, five or six– new French words daily, and that, at the same time, the old words should be kept in use–are points to be considered more fully hereafter…” Home Education, page 80.
Now, most of the CM educators I know are not teaching a second language with the CM method, why is that the case? I believe one of the reasons is simply because there's not many options of curriculums that can gently weave into their daily CM activities.
And this is why CMSS is a great option for you. CMSS has been specially designed with you in mind, so that you learn Spanish during your nature walks, morning basket, tea time, and these through books, nature study, picture study, copy work, read alouds, music, games and even the Swedish Drill.
Something else that makes the CMSS a great option for your family is that the content was created by CM homeschooling parents with a native level of English and Spanish (from Mexico) raising bilingual kids in the United States (teaching them Spanish as a second language). And you may ask why is that so important? Well, for two reasons:
1.- The content was created in Spanish as opposed to be created in English first and then translated/adapted into Spanish. Which could make a big difference because there's always mistakes in a translation. Here's an example of how translated Spanish can go wrong:
English: Please go to the Livingroom.
Translated: Porfavor ve a la sala (please go to the Livingroom).
How it actually is said in Mexico: Ve a la sala por favor (Go to the living room please).
So if you want to speak like a Native, always make sure the content you're learning was first created in the target language and never translated/adapted.
And this takes us to the second reason...
2.-Languages can vary a lot depending on the country. Just like the English spoken at the UK, at the US or South Africa. There will be a lot of similarity and you can understand each other for the most part but there are some difference as well. The same happens with Spanish in Mexico or Spain or any other Spanish Speaking country.
And these differences are not just accent, it could be that the same word has a complete different meaning in two countries. Here's an example:
Mexico: Torta (a sandwich)
Spain: Torta (a cake)
And although this curriculum uses some literature from other Spanish speaking countries (for the sake of exposure to great authors) the audios will be read with a Mexican accent and we won't focus on learning the idioms.
Now that you know what you need to look for in a Foreign Language curriculum let me tell you that CMSS was both:
*Designed to be used by CM families
*Content created by people that were born and raised in Mexico.
As mentioned on the method section, CMSS is a CM based curriculum that will give you the tools to teach your children Spanish during a first stage of a CM Foreign Language Study.
Our Curriculum is divided in Units to help you organize your study better. Each Unit is designed for you to teach it in one (5-6 words daily) or two (2-3words daily). But you are the teacher and you know your child so feel free to adjust those times as you wish.
In Each unit you will learn Spanish with:
-A nature poster with Qr codes you can scan and hear a sentence and nature walk activities (with instructions).
-An audio book. And instructions on how to teach Spanish with the book (the first few units will only include audio to make a gentle transition into learning Spanish).
-An audio poem. You will recieve a bookmark with the qr for the audio porm, and sentences and images to help understand the poem. (With instructions)
-A song. You will receive a beautifully recorded song. A read aloud audio of the song along with no word cards with qrcodes to help you learn the song.
-Instructions and audios for a Gouin series.
-A Spanish challenge that will make you all Speak Spanish around the house one sentence at a time (Card and audio).
As you can see. All the material includes Spanish (native speaker)audios that you can easily access by scaning a qr code conveniently located on each card/poster. And this is why any family can learn with this curriculum, even if you don't speak any Spanish at all!
NOTE: The production of the printables and audios are currently in process and each unit will be made available as we complete recordings and art/design. So please come back soon to find more units or follow our social media to hear about new Units being released!