Little Pim was designed around the latest scientific research regarding language acquisition and brain development. The method combines the work  of  leading neuroscientist Dr. April Benasich, and Julia’s own experience as a language teacher, filmmaker and mother.

The Little Pim series uses the Entertainment Immersion Method®, which engages a child’s natural love of play and learning through repetition.

Children get very attached to the lovable cartoon panda bear, Little Pim, who is the series “teacher.” He invites young viewers to join him in his playful antics as they learn the language along with real children enjoying everyday activities, such as playing, eating, waking and napping.
The entire video series is spoken by native speakers, and words are presented and repeated at regular intervals. Each Little Pim DVD focuses on sixty words and phrases typically acquired in a toddler’s primary language, providing the essential building blocks for language acquisition.

Little Pim is designed and paced for developing minds.

Young children respond enthusiastically to Little Pim’s format, a combination of animation and live action. Babies respond to black and white, and therefore the panda captures the attention of even the youngest viewers. Each video deals with a theme relevant to young kids, and is segmented into 5-minute episodes to accommodate a young child’s attention span and encourage pausing for parent interaction. Simple sentences are broken down into easy-to-understand parts, and reinforced through repetition.


My Review :
For this review I chose the Japanese DVD from Little Pim.  My best friend and her family moved to Japan a couple of years ago with her husband's job.  Since that time she and her family have been learning some of the Japanese language, and when they return to the United States on visits, her children try to teach my kids some Japanese words.  I thought this would be a fun way for my kids to learn some basic Japanese to surprise their friends.

The DVD is cute, and the panda is adorable.  BUT, since it is complete immersion, there is no English translation.  There are quite a few "words" and "phrases" that are said but are difficult to figure out what they mean.  Although my youngest daughter loves watching the DVD, she has not really picked up any of the words, and has a hard time figuring out what some of the words mean on the video.  Even when I sit and watch, I have trouble figuring out some of it - then when a phrase is stated after the "word" there is no way to understand what the "phrase" means.

Thankfully there is Optional Subtitles for Parents - it definitely helps when explaining some of the Japanese words to my kids.

I think this would be great for very young children of bilingual families,and for English speaking families wanting to learn a second language - I think it is better with the subtitle option.  But of course, this is MY opinion.  I think I personally would have done better if I  had chosen Spanish instead of Japanese as I took Spanish classes in High School and still remember a bit.  But I'm just guessing - lol

If you want to have your child learn a second language, and are willing to start them young - then Little Pim does have great quality products to assist with that.