I love audiobooks. They have tons of uses for all families, but can be especially helpful for homeschooling families. I keep a CD player beside my rocking chair so I can listen to books on CD while I knit. I put books on my mp3 player and listen while I’m cleaning house. The kids and I listen to Story of the World on CD as part of their schoolwork. They prefer when I read because they’re not real thrilled with the narration on this CD set, but I can’t read when I have a headache, so the CDs keep us on track.
Both of my kids have become serious audiobook lovers. In fact, Ga’hoole Girl raced through the rest of her schoolwork today because she has been trying to finish listening to Inkheart. Wild Man has trouble reading books that interest him, like Eragon and Eldest, so audiobooks let him enjoy them while he hones his reading skills on less advanced books. Our family also enjoys having audiobooks for long car trips. On our last trip down South, we listened to both Eragon and Eldest.
But, where do we get books to listen to? The only books on CD that I purchase are the Story of the World sets to go with our curriculum. Other than that, we usually get CDs from the library or mp3s off the library website. The library has lots of books on CD (and some on cassette, but we don’t have a working cassette player). The kids get everything from Harry Potter books to The Lord of the Rings series. I am listening to Emma right now, and enjoyed The Devil in the Junior League a few weeks ago. Our library gives us access to OverDrive audiobooks on computer. We can check out books online and transfer them to mp3. They have fiction and non-fiction available.
Books on CD are available to purchase through Amazon and other retailers. Some people, though, purchase audiobooks on mp3 through Audible.com and Christianaudio.com. I haven’t ever used these retailers, so I can’t make any comments about them.
If you haven’t tried audiobooks yet, you might want to check it out. The kids and I love being able to listen to someone else read for a change of pace. Go to Rocks In My Dryer for more great Works For Me Wednesday ideas.
3 comments:
Audio books have saved our lunch time. The kids used to fight and pester each other constantly, something about being with each other 24/7 I think. anyway, I started borrowing audio books from the library to listen to over lunch and the kids have loved it. We are going on a year now and the only problem is we are running out of books from our library to listen too.
I also love audiobooks, although I do not listen to them as often as I would like. If you've never been to librivox.org, you need to check it out. They have tons of free audiobooks available for download. All of the books are in the public domain, so there are plenty of classics available.
Thanks for the comments! I forgot to mention livrivox.org. I haven't used any of their books, but I have visited the site. The best thing is that those books are free, as I recall!
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