Audible Kids Website Brings The Local Library To Your Living Room

Maybe it is the former teacher in me, but I love books. Like every good parent, I foster a love of literacy by spending lots of time reading to my children. Occasionally, I do get tired of reading the same old books over and over again! When it is time for an infusion of new reading material, we usually head to our local library or download books from Audible Kids.

Audible Kids is a site that provides digital spoken audio information and entertainment, and specializes in the spoken experience by providing digital audio editions of children’s books.

They have a dizzying array of books for all ages, even for a former teacher. There are books that have been awarded various medals like the Caldecott and Newbery, favorites (Where the Wild Things Are, Arthur stories by Marc Brown, Beverly Cleary books) and classics (Make Way for Ducklings, Charlotte’s Web, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory).

Anyone can create an account to search for a book in the vast library of audio books. Various ways of searching include typing the title or author into the search field, clicking on criteria (age, grade, running time, price, publication date, and award winning books) on the left hand side of the browser, or locating books narrated by a certain person or from a specific publisher through an advanced search.

I spent forever browsing the various children’s books available through Audible Kids. The site was extremely easy to use and I really fell in love with the Wish List feature that allowed me to browse for titles, listen to audio, and then save titles of books I wanted to purchase in the future. All of the books that I saved in my Wish List were stored in my Profile at the top right of the screen.

I found the audio previews to be very helpful. They are available for each book on the Audible Kids site. The previews are helpful since they are long enough to give a user a good idea of the reader’s tone and the pace of the story. Audible Kids also tells you the listening time of every story on their site.

Audible Kids audio downloads range in price, but tend to be very affordable. Prices begin at $0.99 for single children’s picture books. Chapter books, such as Ramona Quimby, Age 8 is $12.95. Collections are priced higher. I love the idea of collections written by the same author or including the same characters. To view the stories included in collections such as Frog and Toad ($12.95) and The Cat in the Hat and other Dr. Seuss Favorites ($13.95), users click on the “more” button located. Other collections, like the Jan Brett Trio ($1.95) and Robert McCloskey for Young Children ($9.95), includes thumbnail pictures of the titles included with the download.

Some audio downloads are even free due to Audible Kids partnership with Reading is Fundamental, Inc. (RIF). RIF provides free audio downloads to ensure that all children can access books to help them discover the pleasure of reading. There are currently nine titles available for free and include: Brothers Grimm’s Rapunzel, Edgar Allen Poe’s The Tell Tale Heart, Rudyard Kipling’s Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, Hans Christian Anderson’s The Emperor’s New Clothes, and more!

The super simple checkout process makes this site even more of a dream to use. Add books to your cart, click check out, bill purchases to your credit card, and go to the My Downloads to download each title you just purchased. If you use a Mac, your Audible Kids books will download directly to iTunes where you can listen to your audiobooks and transfer them to an iPod. PC users have to install the download software. Audiobooks you purchase from Audible Kids are always available on your “My Downloads” page.

I’ve made several purchases of single children’s books (Make Way for Ducklings and Corduroy), collections including Frog and Toad Audio Selection and The Cat in the Hat and other Dr. Seuss Favorites, while also taking advantage of 2 RIF free downloads (Rikki Tikki Tavi and The Emperor’s New Clothes) and have been incredibly pleased.

My two children (4 and almost 2) love listening to stories in the car. They never complain about not having a hard copy of the book since they enjoy visualizing pictures as they listen to the stories being read. I enjoy listening to our downloads from Audible Kids since they are a nice departure from having to listen to the same songs over and over again. Some of my favorite stories are those from the The Cat in the Hat and other Dr. Seuss Favorites collection where the stories are read by stars like Kelsey Grammar, John Cleese, Billy Crystal and Dustin Hoffman. I see myself downloading many more stories from Audible Kids to put on our iPods for summer car trips and long plane flights.

Huge props to Audible Kids for providing fabulous content through an easy to use interface!

Written by Leticia, a part time working multitasking mama who loves spending time with her husband and two children, exotic vacations, and cooking great meals. Leticia writes about technology products and technology issues affecting children through her blog, Tech Savvy Mama.