A team of experts replacing “foreign” with love:
for children, for stories, for cultures, for Spanish.
You want children to speak real Spanish to real people.
Meet the team who wants to help.
Is there a curriculum company who can finally partner with you to help your young learners speak real Spanish to real people?
Yes, we like to think it’s us.
So, who are we?
Erica Fischer
CEO / Founder
Sara-Elizabeth Cottrell
COO / Official Storyteller
Jose Berenguer
Project Manager / Chief Organizer
Sarah Wakefield
Graphic Designer / Professional Colorer
Julia Aliper
Illustrator / Animator / Cartoon Genius
Lives
Ukraine
Loves
Visual arts, handmade things, animals, books, container gardening
Speaks
Russian, Ukrainian, English, learning Spanish
Here’s the problem:
Teachers need quality curriculum that helps their learners acquire Spanish in real classrooms in real situations, without the expensive hype, without the political demands for content that doesn’t work, and with support across the spectrum of teachers’ Spanish ability.
Here’s the solution:
A company so committed to Spanish we put it in our name.
At Calico Spanish, we aren’t rocket science. We don’t develop for politicians. We are teachers and language learners ourselves, and we exist for one purpose: to provide teachers and children with quality Spanish learning experiences.
Our Journey
Erica wins a Congress-Bundestag scholarship to be an exchange student in Germany, giving her proficiency in German through an immersion experience.
Sara-Elizabeth’s father begins educating her at home and starts his own 5-student homeschool Spanish class
Sara-Elizabeth earns her B.A. in English Education and Spanish Education
Erica begins homeschooling her children and teaching them Spanish and German. A fruitless search for quality programs fail, so she begins to create her own; it will eventually become Calico Spanish.
A family trip to a Costa Rican language school for one month confirms Erica’s belief that a strong immersion program for children is needed.
Kids Immersion, LLC is founded and development begins in earnest on Calico Spanish Classic (Level 1).
Sara-Elizabeth earns her M.A. in Linguistics with a concentration in Second Language Acquisition, then begins teaching at a new school and finds herself in elementary classrooms for the first time.
Sarah W. earns her degree in Graphic Design.
Calico Spanish Classic is in (Level 1) beta testing.
Erica and family take a second trip to Costa Rica to further explore language learning
Calico Spanish Classic for Homeschools is released.
Erica’s family hosts a Costa Rican elementary school teacher for 5 months at their home in Oregon.
Mi guitarrí album is researched, produced, and released
First YouTube videos are released with 7,000 views.
Sara-Elizabeth’s family begins their journey to child bilingualism with the birth of their first child.
Calico Spanish Classic (Level 1) for Schools is released.
Interactive Whiteboard Galleries and Quia activities for Classic are created.
Erica and Sara-Elizabeth team up with 2 other language teaching professionals to start #Langchat on Twitter.
Calico Spanish Accelerate for Schools is released.
Julia joins the team as Graphic Artist
Sara-Elizabeth joins the team as Curriculum Specialist.
Calico Spanish YouTube videos surpass 1 million views.
Sarah W. joins the Calico Spanish team in Graphic Design.
Silvina Martínez joins the team in project management.
Stories Level A “I Am Special” is released.
Erica starts studying Finnish.
Stories Level B “I Love My Family” is released.
Online digital version of Stories is developed.
Stories Level C “I Live Here” is released.
Calico Spanish YouTube videos surpass 2.8 million views per year.
Sara-Elizabeth starts learning Russian.
Erica begins her Master’s in Business Competence and Entrepreneurship
Calico Spanish views on YouTube surpass 10 million!
3000 people “liked” us on Facebook.
Calico Spanish SugarCane Learning Games released.
Paper dolls of our Stories characters developed.
First digital Color and Activities book released.
Not ready to start your
Spanish journey yet?
Get to know us and our unique inquiry‑based approach to exploring the cultures of the Spanish‑speaking peoples; receive three culture capsules to explore with your children.
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