Modern Version of this Fisher Price Record Player Setup?

September 10, 2019 11:11 AM

As a kid, I learned to read by listening to records with follow-along-books, on my trusty brown and orange Fisher Price record player. Now I have a three year old and I know he'd go nuts for something similar. I don't want to give him any kind of generic tech to solve this (no smartphone/tablets, etc.), but is there a modern equivalent?

Or should i just scour ebay and go old school? What do kids use these days who want to read along with an audio recording? (We read to him TONS, I just know he'd like to do it alone sometimes).

posted by amoeba to Technology (9 answers total)

Our library has sets of audiobook/book packaged together. They also have a ton of kids books on CD, Playaways, and e-resources.

I can't put my hands on the search term to find the audiobook/book together, but its worth checking out your local library to see if they have them. You could also just borrow each item separately if they don't.

We almost always have an audiobook in our truck playing.
posted by Ftsqg at 11:28 AM on September 10, 2019 [2 favorites]

We used to get the book/audiotape combination from Scholastic book club at school. Here's 1 series from Amazon. Your community ad/or school library will be able to help you find more.
posted by theora55 at 11:37 AM on September 10, 2019

Check your local library for Vox books or Wonderbooks which are picture books with the audio embedded inside.
posted by tangosnail at 1:04 PM on September 10, 2019

Search for "read along" books. Buy a used cd player at a thrift store and show your kid how to use it.

My library has these filed as "book plus CD".

Bonus, you can find lots of music on CDs at the thrift store as well, and kiddo can start developing his own music taste. Or you can burn discs (maybe?) and give him a head start.
posted by hydra77 at 1:53 PM on September 10, 2019

My library has a small collection of these (book + CD) - we call them "kits". Highly recommend checking them out from the library (if yours has them) to see if they work for you - they are hit or miss with my three year old and fairly expensive. But I love them too so I hope she gets into them when she's a little older!
posted by Knicke at 1:56 PM on September 10, 2019

When I was a kid, I used a red and white Fisher Price tape player to listen to read-along tapes while following along in the corresponding storybooks. That thing was a tank and survived four kids and several tumbles down the stairs. I see Fisher Price makes a CD player now, which could be used for playing the book+CD combos from the library.
posted by abeja bicicleta at 3:31 PM on September 10, 2019

Is there a reason a regular record player is out? Records are cheap on eBay and Discogs and a used record player is too. Kids additionally love playing with anything that is "meant" for grownups.
posted by agregoli at 5:31 AM on September 11, 2019 [1 favorite]

We got our kid his own new record player for his 3rd birthday - it has a start button that moves the needle automatically, and it played though a pair of computer speakers, so he could work it by himself. It was way easier than teaching him how to work the CD player in our bigger stereo system. I got a bunch of Disney read along records at garage sales, but he was more interested in dancing than reading along, so Raffi and the Jungle Book soundtrack were the biggest hits.

Now he’s six and uses the record player to dance to Vampire Weekend (another garage sale find). He basically learned how to read by watching Bill Nye the Science Guy on Netflix with the closed captioning on.
posted by Maarika at 7:58 AM on September 11, 2019

This is the record player we got.
posted by Maarika at 8:03 AM on September 11, 2019 [1 favorite]