When was the last time you listened to a good audio book? And when, I ask you in all seriousness, was the last time your kids did? I bring this up 'cause about a couple of years ago I found a great resource for FREE audiobooks on the web (of course it's free, that's what I live for)(hee hee hee). I'm referring to LibriVox. Their site is filled with free classic audiobooks, all for the downloading. The site has a catalog and you can search by genre, which I do, for "children." They have hundreds of entries there, some of which are short stories and the rest of which are full books. One of my children has gotten a bunch of Sherlock Holmes stories, and the other is currently into both the L. Frank Baum Oz books and the Tom Swift adventure books (by various authors). They both listen to their stories as they go to sleep or do things quietly in their rooms (which in our house happens very rarely). It's a great way to keep your kids interested in reading, especially if you want them to learn a bit about some classic books. I say "classic" 'cause LibriVox, like Project Gutenberg, only deals with out-of-copyright books (ie, pre-1923). That's not so bad, though, because there are a ton of really, REALLY good books on there free for the taking.
If you're interested in getting one of these books and are hesitant 'cause you've not done this before, it's easy: go to LibriVox.org, click on "Librivox catalog" on the box on the left, and run from there, filling in either an author or a title, or look below that and you can click on "browse entire catalog." Assuming you found the book you want, you then get to that page, and scroll down to where each file (or chapter) is named. After the file name, there are several several file types listed. Right click on the type you want (I usually choose the mp3@128kps) and tell them the location to which you'd like to save the file (I put them in my "downloads" folder). You have to do that with each file. Relatively speaking, an easy process, and fast, depending on the speed of your connection. After you get all the files you need (or want), you just need to play them, either on your computer or your mp3 player or (my choice for my kids) on a cd. I'll leave those directions to you. But if you need any directions on MS Media Player, I've got it in XP and Vista, so send me a note and I'll send directions.
I've gotten probably 25 books from LibriVox so far, and am currently work on another. I hope you all check it out and give it a try. It's a great idea well executed!
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