Meet Maja, an 8-year-old aspiring writer from Munich. In four original audio stories, your family will hike down a mountain at dusk, celebrate St. Martin’s Day at a fairy-tale castle, gather treasures for Oma’s birthday and try running a farm in the Black Forest. Each story is about 30 minutes, made for kids ages 5–11, and easy to play in the car, over lunch or at bedtime. The whole Germany set is free, including 13 printables, three recipes and the country guide in the other tabs.
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Maja, an eight-year-old German girl from Munich, travels with her family to the nearby Bavarian Alps to take the cable car up to the top of the mountain. But after missing the last cable car back down for the day, the family is forced to hike down and meet a very interesting stranger along the way. As it grows dark on the mountain, the family struggles to make it down. Will the stranger be able to help?
Maja and her family take a trip to the countryside to experience life on a real German farm, complete with cows for milking, chickens for eggs, and pigs for… well… getting into trouble. When the farm owner has to leave for a few days because of an emergency, Maja’s family kindly offers to manage the farm for him. After all, how hard could it be to look after a few animals? They all quickly find out.
Maja and her family visit the famous castle Neuschwanstein and celebrate one of Maja’s favorite holidays — St. Martin’s Day. When Maja sees a homeless man walking up the road, she wants to help him, but she wonders what someone as young as her can do. She finds out that sometimes just a little kindness is all it takes to change someone’s life.
Turn Maja’s stories into a screen-free Germany unit study. This part of the free country guide explores German geography with maps, the Brothers Grimm and the Black Forest, Neuschwanstein Castle, and the cozy afternoon tradition of Kaffee und Kuchen at a German bakery. Kids can also draw a “House in the Alps” in charcoal and pastel with art teacher Susan Garrison, in a lesson made just for Around the World Stories.
Did you know? Neuschwanstein Castle helped inspire Walt Disney’s Sleeping Beauty Castle. About one third of Germany is covered in forest.
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Celebrate the year the way families in Germany do. Find out what makes Oktoberfest so festive, learn about Dirndl dresses, make a paper lantern for a St. Martin’s Day walk, discover German birthday (Geburtstag) traditions and try a kindness challenge inspired by Maja.
Did you know? There are so many visitors to Munich during Oktoberfest that the city speeds up the escalators to keep the crowds moving.
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Bring Germany into your kitchen with three recipes to make together: Weckmann, the sweet bread figures baked for St. Martin’s Day; soft, salty Bavarian pretzels; and Maja’s Apfelstrudel, warm apples and cinnamon rolled in thin pastry. Each one comes as a printable recipe card.
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Print, color and play: coloring pages drawn from Maja’s stories, a Germany map, a Western Europe map challenge, St. Martin’s lanterns, Stadt Land Fluss (a favorite German word game), a Tell a Story fairy-tale game, a German challenge and a kindness calendar.
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“My kids beg to listen to these stories! They are each so unique! I love that they can enjoy the stories and learn about far away places at the same time. They are really easy to listen to which matters to me, especially when I want to turn one on in a hurry.”
– Julie Morris
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We know your family will enjoy the journey!
