This Christmas I decided to give out black children’s books to the children in my life. I wanted to give out books that come with a recording of the book because my son just loves when we borrow library books that come with a cd. He likes to “read” along with the books while I’m driving so I maybe other kids would like to do the same. Initially, I searched online for books with recordings but there was such a limited selection that I decided to make my own.

I chose Trish Cooke’s “So Much” because it’s one of my son’s favorite books and honestly, I just love reading it. The book reminds me of my family growing up plus I get to use my Jamaican accent!

Recording the book turned out to be easier than I thought. Most importantly, the whole undertaking was free so I thought I would share how I did it.

I think that this would be a great way to have grandma or other relatives who live far away to read to a bedtime story to your little one. (I also sent copies of the books so the kids can “read” along with me.)

So here’s how I did it:

1. Download Voice Record Pro App

I tried a few ways to record the book but they were a bit complicated and involved too many steps for someone like me who isn’t very tech savvy. Just by chance I decided to search iTunes for a recording app and came across Voice Record Pro which turned out to be really easy to use. I actually figured it out without a manual!

2. Practice, practice, practice

I suggest that you practice reading the book a few times and make a note of the places where you stumble. For me, it was adding words to one section of the book so I had to be aware of that when I was reading. One thing I love about the app is that you can pause the recording while you flip the page or just to take a breath to get your cadence back on track. If you make a mistake while you are reading the book, the app allows you to cut the recording off at the point where you made the mistake and append a replacement.

3. Save and email

I absolutely love that you can save the recording as an mp3 and send it via email. You can also add the recording to your Google drive or a drop box account for downloading later if the file is too large. Of course, you can always go old school and burn a cd after you have saved the file to your computer.

I hope you find this tip as helpful as I did. There aren’t enough audiobooks of black children’s books so until there are more selections, I will continue reading and recording my own audiobooks as gifts. Let me know in the comments if you have any questions or you can always email me. I would be happy to walk you through the process.