I've always wanted to have a listening center in my classroom... but I've always been overwhelmed by the amount of materials involved (and their need to be organized, and stay organized). Most listening centers I've seen on pinterest and teaching blogs are made up of a mix of tapes and cds... plastic baggies... books...ugh! I hate how mix-mashy that is... and the amount of space it takes up in the classroom... bulky headphones connected to ancient tape decks. I understand WHY that's how it is, though. Teachers don't have a lot of money to spend on new up-to-date stuff - not to mention the money involved in building an audio library! So... in short, that's why I've never got around to doing it.
But... a listening center has always tugged at my heart... Studies show that listening to well read literature is one of the best ways to build a child's fluency. And FLUENCY is HUGE at the 2/3rd grade level. SO! I've taken all the can-do spirit I've mustered up (after two long years away from my beloved classroom) and done some problem solving.
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One of the most amazing things I've found out? You can actually buy reasonably priced used iPods off of Ebay. Cool, huh? I got each one of these for $30 or less... One I even got for FREE by posting a need for old mp3 players on my city's freecycle site. And one I just had laying around the house. Now I have a nice little fleet of 6 iPods for my listening center.
Now I just have to build a listening library, right? Easy-peasy. I invested in a fairly cheap external mic for my computer ($25) and have started to record myself reading books I already own on Garageband and then exporting ("sharing") them to iTunes.
I also found, while exploring Ebay, that Wendy's (yes, the burger joint) put audio books of popular series in their kids meals for a while. I found quite a few of these on Ebay for as cheep as $1-$2 per CD. There are Magic Tree House books and Geronimo Stilton! I have the actual books already so my kids will be able to read along with the authors. Cool, huh?
I haven't bought any yet, but it also seems you can buy audio books through iTunes for about $2-$5 each. I may buy a few as the year goes on... to go with books I already own.
So I'm keeping all my own recordings in iTunes, organized into playlists by type of book (or book, if it's a chapter book). I've also uploaded all of the CDs I bought on Ebay, so everything is there! I've loaded the iPods with about half of what I have so far, with the intention of adding more as the year goes on.
My plan is to set up the iPods at a "charging station" and keep a box of books up-to-date with the audio books that are currently on the iPods. I'll post pics of that later when I get it all set up in my classroom. I'm hoping it won't be too difficult to manage... and, with it being digitized, my students won't have trouble keeping the area tidy :)
Happy Teaching!
Marieka
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