Organizing iPods in the Classroom {giveaway closed}

Awhile ago, I shared with you my plan to convert old books on tape to MP3 and use them on iPods in my classroom.  Well, I am finally all finished!  I'm here with a tutorial today to show you everything I did!

First, I collected some supplies:

• Tape player
• 3.5mm cord
• Books on tape with matching books
• Download the free program Audacity

I made a little video for you to see how I did it.



Here are my bags of books hanging up.

I put 5 stories on each iPod.  I then put the books in a hanging bag and slapped one of my iPod Labels on the front.  The kids would take a bag and know instantly which iPod they needed.

Check out these labels on TpT!

Just to be safe, I keep my iPods in this safe tucked under my desk.  During reading time, I open it and my "Device Manager" (that's a class job) is in charge of passing them out.

If you have multiple of the same book, you could get this splitter to make the iPod a group center.

I also got some silicone cases for my ipods.  I felt like it would help the kids from dropping them on the floor.  

From left the right: my old nano from 6 years ago, my cousin's that she didn't use anymore, the purple one I was able to purchase with school supply money, and the last two were a generous donation from Donorschoose.  

Well, silly me, but I accidentally ordered too many covers!  So, I have 4 left: black, green, pink, and clear.  They fit the newest 7th Generation.  And I'm going to give them away!

This one will be short and sweet: just leave a comment below telling me if you can use them in your classroom.  I'll throw in a set of the organization labels, too.  But you better go quick!  The giveaway ends tonight at 10pm Hawaii Standard Time.

*****Edit 7/22/13******

I used my old 2007 Macbook Pro to convert my tapes.  I usually leave this laptop at school to use with my projector (the school gave us Netbooks, which don't work very well and you can't play discs on them, so I don't use mine).  I decided to use it to make my tutorial because I already had downloaded Audacity on it, so it was one less step.  

On my old Macbook, I plugged the 35 mm cord into the microphone jack:

A newer Mac doesn't have that jack, it just has the headphone.  So, you will need to purchase a USB adapter to make it work.

Hope that helps!  If you are still having problems or have questions, you can find many answers here.  I am not a technology genius, so this is all the help I'm equipped to give! Lol.

I'm linking up with Blog Hoppin!