If you live in the Austin area and want to brush up on your Spanish skills, or teach a child to learn Spanish, there’s a really fun way to do it without buying expensive programs or even taking a class. You can do it by immersing yourself (or your child) into literature and films that you are already familiar with, but that are in Spanish. The best of these, of course, are of the children’s variety, since they have simpler words that are more often used in conversation—and that are easier for us to learn and understand.

Take the book Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear? by Bill Martin Jr. and Eric Carle. It’s one of those classic children’s stories that many of us already know by heart, or that we are at least familiar with. My daughter has nearly all of the books that Carle has illustrated, so they are pretty beloved in our home.

Check out a book that you love, like this one, in Spanish if your library offers it. In this case, the book is Oso polar, oso polar, que es ese ruido? My daughter and I read it out loud together several times to get the feel of the words and to start associating them with Spanish. I must admit it was hard, since there was plenty of r-rolling in the book! But by the time we were finished, she had learned several new Spanish vocabulary words, including the names of several animals that she loves.

Films work very well this way, too. My Japanese roommate in college learned a lot of English by listening to popular music and watching films like Shrek over and over again. I remember that we watched movies like The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast in my high school Spanish class as well, which was not only fun to do, but very informative. It also trains your ear to become comfortable with the accents and words, which is key, since a huge portion of learning another language is centered around simply listening. Another big portion, of course, is practicing—so reading books like this one over and over again can really help. If you’re learning with a child or friend, having him or her repeat the sentence or word after you (once you’ve read it aloud a couple of times) may also help with pronunciation skills.