DIY audio CDs

[prata_queen]

I was thinking of ways to increase reading time with my 4 year old between 8-9pm, you know, the precious after-dinner and before-sleeping timeslot.


I got the idea of the audio book by reading Chen’s blog where she recited and recorded Chinese Compositions for Little Boy. I would like to do the same for children story books in the hope that this can quicken the pace that she achieves independent reading.

Parents who have created your own audio CDs, would you like to share how you went about doing it for the benefit of the less tech-savy ones out there? I’m the first to confess I’m not tech-savvy!

Useful information to include in your post:
-\tsoftware (name of software, price and where to purchase/ url to download)
-\tequipment (brand, price and where to purchase)
-\tothers

[ronseng]

Please let me know if you find a solution?

[Wan]

How about buying a talking pen & related books? They come with stickers for u to paste on other books & recordable on MP3. U can find out more from emoti.com.sg. It was at recent popular book fest but I got mine from China

[tankee]

if you are using MS Windows PC and has a microphone & a CD burner attached


- look for this program called "Sound Recorder", it is bundled with MS Windows, to record the audio

- use windows media player to burn the audio on to a CD

[Oppsgal]

I am still old fashion. Using cassette tape player to record onto cassettes.


Record my voice in. Becoming a DJ for my kid.

[buds]

I bought some children story books that came with CDs when my children were younger. While I'm okay reading it to them with loads of expression n animated faces... the CDs came with music. :please: There'd be a suspense tune for the tension build-up in the stories in like Gingerbreadman and songs too... there would also be beautiful sounds of merriment should the story include a dancing scene... Nice! You can try a few from the Ladybird series first n see if you like them before getting from other authors or series which can be more pricey.


Story line n dialogues run page by page as per story being read. Encourages independent reading for intermediate readers or even early readers who can already use their finger (pointer) to point at words when reading.

If you wanna test how your voice sounds over media player, if you have iPhone can try using the voice memos under utilities (if I'm not mistaken). See if you have \"the reading voice\"... when you replay your test-stories.

Hope this helps.

[prata_queen]

Thanks all for your suggestions.


Tankee, I’ll pass on your suggestion to dh to explore. Hope it works!

Buds, my gal recently listened to a Scholastic series of 26 books, A to Z. While she was excited to sit down and flip the pages whenever there was the ‘PING’ sound, she wasn’t able to follow and point to each word. She is coming to 4yo. I think there are some crucial factors to enable the child to follow the CD independently:-

-\tSufficient familiar words that the child recognizes by sight so the child doesn’t get totally lost.
-\tAge-appropriate.
-\tStory must have a storyline and be interesting.

The Scholastic series aimed to introduce as many words beginning with each alphabet, per book but I find that there is hardly any storyline and was boring. Also, there were many words that my girl did not know. I think it is not age appropriate for her.

Thus I think the best way is for me to select her favorite books and DIY our own audio CD. She probably already knows the stories by heart and will be able to follow the words as the CD plays along.

[Chenonceau]

You can VERY easily record audio with ANY personal computer. Press the Start button on your PC or laptop. Go to All Programs\Accessories\Sound Recorder. Plug in a microphone (costs about $10)… press the Start Recording button and when you are done recording, press stop and save your file in a folder.


The audio file thus recorded, plays on Windows Media Player that comes loaded as standard software in any PC. Just double click on the file from Windows Explorer and it’ll play. You can put the file on any iPOD like thing… When he wants to, my DS carries his audio files in a little cube audio player that I bought from 7 Eleven.

You should not have to buy any big deal software or hardware to record. Most PCs have in-built microphones too. I like to use a plug-in for better control and to screen out extraneous voices (people’s footsteps… others talking) that always happens when we are recording.

If this is not clear enough, let me know. I’ll do a post on my personal blog with step by step screen shot uploads.

[buds]

prata_queen:

Buds, my gal recently listened to a Scholastic series of 26 books, A to Z. While she was excited to sit down and flip the pages whenever there was the ‘PING’ sound, she wasn’t able to follow and point to each word. She is coming to 4yo.

My children were very very young when we started reading stories aloud. For the part on pointing to words during reading, it was normal practice in our case. They did not have to know what the words are. I guided the pointing-process at that stage. (guided pointing) For DD2, that was how she \"picked\" up words! Yes, literally memorizing words by reading & pointing to them at the same time. Be it with Peter and Jane books.. or their favourite story books.. For DD1, she picked up the sounds in words. She'd be sensitive to beginning sounds first as i read slowly and emphasizing on initial sounds. Later on the ending sounds and when she was more advanced with phonetic rules and sound combinations, she figured out the rest. That's how different both of them are. Both were early readers as young as 3.5 to 4 years old... reading simple books on their own. Even if they were a few words per page kinda reading or simple sentence a page reading.

When independent reading gradually improves, reduce pointing for better reading flow & fluency. They will then slowly grow into the silent reading stage for personal enjoyment & fulfilment.

prata_queen:

I think there are some crucial factors to enable the child to follow the CD independently:-

-\tSufficient familiar words that the child recognizes by sight so the child doesn’t get totally lost.
-\tAge-appropriate.
-\tStory must have a storyline and be interesting.

Attractive illustrations are a must for children this young. They begin to like a book via the pictures first. We look thoroughly at the pictures and encourage description for every character.. the character's costume, hairstyle, looks.. the scenery in the picture.. Pictures tell a thousand words they say.

Words should preferably not be too small and spaced nicely for effective pointing-of-words routine. Guided reading is mainly encouraging sight word recognition for most children. Hence i mentioned it isn't really necessary for a child to know familiar words prior to beginning reading. Children require guidance at this stage for sure. For my DD1's case, who was more sensitive to sounds... it's an exception.

prata_queen:

The Scholastic series aimed to introduce as many words beginning with each alphabet, per book but I find that there is hardly any storyline and was boring. Also, there were many words that my girl did not know. I think it is not age appropriate for her.

Mebbe it wasn't so much not age-appropriate. Perhaps it was more to the fact that there was no storyline since the series you used aimed at encouraging more vocab instead of a story... hence not offering much of an interest to her at that moment.

prata_queen:

Thus I think the best way is for me to select her favorite books and DIY our own audio CD. She probably already knows the stories by heart and will be able to follow the words as the CD plays along.

In our case, we grew up reading Ladybird story books from simple ones to more challenging ones and some of the simple ones came with the audio CDs. For story books you already own, guess it would then be a great idea to DIY since she is more familiar with them already; hence being able to relate to the stories better... which may result in capturing her interest to read independently.

Agree with Chenonceau that there is no need for expensive equipment at all.

[prata_queen]

Chen, thanks so much! I can picture it mentally. Let me go and try it out.


Buds, my gal is a fast learner but when it comes to independent reading with her, we just can’t seem to ‘achieve’ it. We used to read every night, but ever since #2 was born, we hardly read. So she seems to have stagnated for a year.