Little Pim, a winner of 22 awards, uses the immersion method to help children, up to about age six, learn a second language. Little Pim offers products in 10 different languages, including Chinese and Hebrew.  Two of their products are the books, “Colors” and “Feelings.” The books are told in English, with French and Spanish translations included. The books include flaps and pull tabs for the little ones and pronunciation guides for the adults. The stories are told in a hide-and-seek style, so that children search for the correct pictures on the pull tabs and under the flaps. “Feelings” focuses on emotions and expressions. “Colors” focuses on colors and objects.

These books are perfect for the younger ages. They can be used independently or as part of the Little Pim learning sets. We received only the books for review, and have used them independently. It is intended to be used as a read-aloud, since the target age range is birth to 6 years of age. In both stories, Pim the Panda asks your child to find certain items. For example, in the “Colors” book, Pim will be looking for a certain color of balloon. Your child will lift flaps on the page to locate it. Along the same lines, in the “Feelings” book, Pim will be feeling a certain emotion. You and your child will pull tabs to find pictures of other children feeling the same emotion as Pim. The story reads in English, but will include the colors or feelings (depending on the book) in Spanish and French with pronunciations.  It is up to the parent whether to translate in Spanish, French, or both.

I have been reading these books with my 3-year-old daughter for several weeks. Occasionally, I will suggest we read the books, but, more times than not, she brings them to me and asks that I read them. Other times, she simply picks up the books and begins “reading” them on her own.  For weeks, she even insisted on taking them along on car rides as well. My daughter, at almost four years old, can easily lift the flaps and pull the tabs on her own. She quickly caught on to the storyline and enjoys seeking out the item or person in question, such as the red balloon or the shy child. Since we have already introduced her to some very basic Spanish, I only translated the colors and feelings into Spanish.  She has enjoyed learning the new names for familiar words, like "verde" for "green" and "timido" for "shy." Each flap and tab gives another opportunity to try out the new words. Over the past several weeks, she has enjoyed the books and the learning experience.  She has become familiar with hearing the new words for the colors and the feelings, and can say several with little to no prompting. Considering the huge number of books around our home, the fact that my daughter consistently chooses these at story time says a lot about these books. Watching my daughter learn in such an enjoyable way has been a great experience for this mom.

Product Review by Kimberly Lacey, The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine, LLC, August, 2012