A life without Benjamin Blümchen, My Friend Connie and the Grüffelo is unthinkable, especially for younger children. You probably remember your own favorite cassettes or radio play CDs from your childhood. As a modern variant of the classic listening media, there are nowadays so-called listening boxes. But what exactly can Tonie, Tigerbox and Co. actually do?
Listening boxes, also called music boxes, are available from various suppliers. Depending on the manufacturer, the prices differ, but are mostly under 100, – €. When you buy a box, stories are often included. However, if you want more audio stories or songs for your child, there may be subsequent costs.
The boxes all work on a similar principle: they are child-friendly and usually designed like a cube. Above all, they are easy to use. Colorful pens or figurines in the form of animals that you plug into the audio box, or connect via Bluetooth, can play all kinds of stories. You can also get creative yourself and record (your own) stories.
Listening boxes are specially designed to meet the needs and motor skills of younger children and are designed not to break quickly. The few functions are easy to perform, so your child can operate the box independently. Selecting and starting stories themselves, pausing, stopping or exchanging them as needed – the young users can do all this on their own. Children as young as about two years old can operate the devices intuitively. This can boost your child’s self-confidence.
Some boxes offer the possibility to set a time limit. This will help your child stick to agreed upon listening times.
Audio boxes can be used to play audio games and music, whether for entertainment or to learn new things. If the stories are stored on animal figures or similar, these figures can also be used as toys.
Find out about the different listening boxes to decide which one is right for your child. What is the right shape? Are the stories stored on some kind of USB stick or does the box always have to be connected to the Internet? How much do new stories cost?
Research what age the stories you want to listen to with the box are appropriate for. Since your child can also use the listening box on his or her own, an age-appropriate selection is especially important. Also inquire about the data protection of the respective box: What private data is collected? How is the personal information of the users protected?
We present the most popular boxes in more detail on the Parents’ Guide: Tigerbox, Toniebox and Hörbert.
An audio box does not replace the togetherness of your own reading aloud: Regularly take the time to read to your child from their favorite book or listen to the audio stories from the box together.
Did you know that your child can hear even before he or she is born? The ear is the first sensory organ to be formed during pregnancy.
Hearing also plays a special role in baby and toddlerhood. Babies can recognize mom’s voice at an early age. Hearing is important for perceiving the environment and learning to speak. Since young children cannot yet read, they are especially dependent on hearing. They like to be read to or listen to radio plays. As soon as children begin to speak, they narrate to themselves while playing.
Especially at kindergarten age, children can be inspired with audio media. It doesn’t always have to be movies and videos. From the age of about 3 years, you can produce small audio games together or play games with sounds. This trains accurate listening and helps to learn to speak well.
With small children (about 3 years), you can just take a walk and listen carefully: What do we hear? What actually makes a noise?
If your child is already a little older (from 4 years) you can go on a sound safari together. Every smartphone has a built-in microphone, and many also have an app for recording voice memos. Go outside, e.g. to the forest, collect all kinds of sounds together. When you listen to it afterwards, do you or your child recognize what the sounds were?
Produce your own radio play (suitable for children from approx. 4 years). Almost every child has a favorite book or story. Make a little radio play out of it together. Read the dialogues with divided roles and think about how to implement sounds. What does it sound like when it’s raining or storming outside? An overview of how you can create sounds yourself can be found here.
If the weather doesn’t invite you to go outside, your child can solve audio puzzles at audiyoukids.de or Planet Schule, set a story to music themselves or put together an audio play. Accompany your child in this process – especially if he or she cannot yet read. Older children (elementary school age and up) also learn to edit sound recordings here.
Also, check out the reading tips further down this page. There you will find more ideas for creative media projects and more.
Then let’s get to the ears and have fun listening and making sounds together!
Young people use streaming services for music and podcasts. Audio books are also very popular. Those who don’t feel like reading themselves or want to listen to stories on the go use them via apps and audio libraries. The offer for different age groups is constantly growing.
Unlike audio plays, audio books are read books. Speakers read the books aloud. The recordings can then be listened to via audiobook apps, streaming services, audio files or CD. Radio plays differ from audio books in that the stories are acted out as in a film or series – with distributed roles, music and sounds.
Children like stories – they are exciting, provide role models, and relieve boredom. The special thing about audio stories: They stimulate the imagination and encourage the creativity of young listeners. Entire worlds are created in the mind. Audiobooks are a nice opportunity to dive into stories and other worlds. In the same way, they can take up challenging topics and explain them to children, convey values, provide comfort, train listening skills and contribute to language development.
Many children are read books at a young age and associate these situations with positive feelings. Parents don’t always have time to read aloud. Then audio books and audio plays offer a good supplement. At some point, children feel too old to be read to. Some children and teens have a hard time reading whole books. Others can best “read books with their ears” because they are blind or visually impaired. Audiobooks can also be an incentive for children who don’t like to read to discover books and then pick up a book themselves. Another advantage of audio books and audio plays: Children can listen again and again to stories or scenes that move them in terms of content.
Make sure the audio content is appropriate for children and their age. There are audiobooks (and radio plays) that can emotionally overwhelm, frighten, or scare children. The choice is huge. Consider the following criteria when making your selection:
Use theme filters when choosing and pay attention to the description and age recommendation. Audio stories that have been awarded the Auditorix audiobook seal are especially recommended. An overview by age incl. You can get audio samples of the individual audiobooks in the Auditorix online database.
You and your child can get audiobooks and audio plays in a number of ways. There are free and paid offerings.
Most (public) libraries have a digital offering. Via the so-called Onleihe, which is available as an app, electronic audio files can be borrowed, among other things. All that is needed is a library card, which children and teens up to age 18 can usually get for free at their local library. Audio books are also lent out on site, e.g. on CDs or as Tonie figures for the audio box.
The audio libraries of the public broadcasters also have a large offer. The audio libraries are available as web version or app. In the ARD audio library and the Dlf Audiothek there is a lot of audio content for children.
On the Internet, you can download self-produced audio books and audio plays free of charge at vorlesen.net (also available as an app). Mostly classic stories like the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm, stories of Karl May, etc. There is a separate section for children & teenagers. LibriVox makes a similar offer – but the site is in English. German audio content can also be displayed via filtering.
Well-known music streaming services – like Spotify and Amazon Music – also offer audio plays and audiobooks. Since the free accounts often only have basic features, they are not unrestricted for this. Spotify Kids can only be used with a premium account and offers access to child-friendly audio content without advertising.
In addition, there are apps and platforms just for audiobooks. The best known are probably Audible, Amazon‘s offering, and BookBeat.
Younger children in particular can listen to stories via an audio box. New content can be downloaded and uploaded or new figures can be purchased for the Toniebox.
If your child uses audiobook apps or streaming services independently, the child mode should be activated – if available. Listening to audiobooks is also media use that should be part of family media rules. Balance this out so that your child gets enough exercise and variety.
At least since the beginning of the corona pandemic, podcasts have become very popular among young people. Young people listen not only to age-appropriate podcasts, but occasionally to ones aimed primarily at adults.
Podcasts are usually audios that can be accessed online, subscribed to, and sometimes saved to listen to over and over again. There are also video podcasts or podcast that are played out as audio and video. New episodes are published on a regular basis. Many podcast formats have a major overarching theme, such as sports, culture, or news. They can be completed stories per episode or sequels. Very popular are, among others, true-crime podcasts, in which real criminal cases are re-told.
Audio formats are easy to listen to on the go and are good at relieving boredom. There are podcasts where people talk about their everyday life or “God and the world” as well as thematic formats. Hearing people are entertained and learn new things. Often podcasts are personal, which makes young listeners feel close to podcasters, similar to influencers on social media.
On the one hand, there are podcasts that are deliberately made for young people and dedicated to youth topics. On the other hand, more and more influencers are producing podcasts, which are therefore also interesting for their young fans. They are called “Dick & Doof”, “Hobbylos” or “Gemütlich Nachsitzen”.
Up to now, podcasts have not had to be age-labeled in the same way as videos or games in order to protect minors. So anyone can publish a podcast with any content. Therefore, regularly ask what podcasts your child listens to and find out about them. Young people have access to all kinds of podcasts via portals like Spotify and the like. Via the platform’s algorithm, other content is suggested that they cannot assess. Podcasts also include more and more advertising, sometimes read aloud by the podcasters themselves or played in by the platforms before or after. Many podcasts are financed through this.
Podcast aimed specifically at young people are usually commercial-free, have an age recommendation, and address topics of interest to young people. But there are definitely podcasts that don’t have a specific age recommendation, but are still well suited for teens. We have put together a few tips:
For more tips on podcasts for teens, check out Webhelm and the city magazine Kangaroo.
A few years ago, there were still cassettes with which children could listen to the stories of Benjamin Blümchen, the little raven Sock and children’s songs of all kinds. Insert the cassette into the recorder, press “Play” and off you go! It was also child’s play to record your own sounds, music or stories on cassette.
Today, small listening boxes such as the tigerbox and Toniebox moved into the children’s rooms. These play stories as soon as an associated figure is placed on the box. A great thing for the kids, but also very expensive. Yet such a radio play box can be recreated with a little skill and a smartphone!
Now this all sounds very technical, but it’s not at all. The radio play box is replaced by a cell phone and the character by an NFC chip. The rest is done by the selected app almost by itself.
First, make sure that the smartphone supports NFC. NFC is short for near field communication. In other words, communication between two elements: the smartphone and the chip, which can only communicate with each other within a few centimeters. You can see if your device supports NFC in the smartphone settings by searching for NFC and activating it. The position of the NFC reader is in the center of the back of the device in most smartphones. Put the purchased NFC stickers ready.
Now it’s about the app, which is supposed to program the NFC chip. It’s easier than it sounds! The matching app is available in the Play Store or Apple Store. With the paid app NFC Tools PRO audio files that are on the smartphone can be programmed directly onto the chip. This doesn’t work as easily with other apps. The corresponding app will now open.
Hold the NFC chip against the back of the smartphone. After the chip has been recognized by the app, its properties are displayed in it (under READ). To describe the chip, it must be assigned a task. To do this, go to TASKS > Add task > Sound & Media > Play a sound file > and select the desired audio file. To program this command now to the NFC chip, Write must be clicked under TASKS. To do this, the chip must once again be held against the back of the cell phone. After that you will receive a confirmation of the overwriting.
Now the chip is programmed and the audio can be played when it is held on the back of the smartphone.
With these basic building blocks, you can now get creative together with your child. The NFC chip or sticker can be attached to game pieces, stuffed animals, etc. A container made of Lego, cardboard or wood for the smartphone can be connected and become a whole personal listening box with a speaker. For ideas on how to create your own audio content, check out our article “Listening Projects for Kids.”
Making your own listening box can be a fun family project. Children and parents learn about technology together and can get creative.
Even more ideas for homemade listening boxes can be found on the following pages:
Spotify Kids is an offer from the streaming provider Spotify, through which selected music, radio plays or podcasts are accessible for children and parents are provided with corresponding setting options.
A dedicated editorial team selects the child-friendly audio content for Spotify Kids, so that only Spotify content that is suitable for children and young people is available. There are songs by musicians popular with children, movie music and many compiled playlists. In addition, radio plays such as Benjamin Blümchen or podcasts such as the “Sendung mit der Maus” can be listened to online and offline.
An interface designed especially for children with large images is intended to appeal to young users and make it easier for them to use it independently with simple operation.
Parents can choose between five different profiles and associated content. There are setting options for younger (0 – 6 years) and for older children (5 – 12 years).
The offer is part of Spotify Premium Family, which allows multiple people to use the Premium service at the same time without commercial interruptions. Each family member gets their own account.
Children love to listen to stories and music. As a parent, you may not always have the time to read to your child or turn on certain songs. For such situations, it is helpful if children can choose and save audio content themselves. Being able to choose media content independently is a great experience for many children and contributes to self-determined media use – but it should always be accompanied by you.
With similar services, such as YouTube Kids, it was observed that, despite a pre-selection, problematic content and content not suitable for children could also be seen time and again. Whether this is also the case with Spotify Kids is still difficult to assess, because the offer has only been available since May 2020. However, it is important to take a critical look at the audio content your child is using, despite the pre-selection. Users complain that the offer is not sufficient and parents should be given the option to add Spotify tracks themselves.
Spotify stores the usage behavior of its customers in order to optimize the product. Privacy issues should always be considered when selecting and installing a suitable streaming service.
When using Spotify Family Premium, parents can set which content children can and cannot listen to. The audio content selected by the children is visible to the parents for up to three months. You can then decide which songs, radio plays, and podcasts you’d rather take out of the app.
Offers such as Spotify Kids can tempt children to be left alone with their media use. However, a selection of child-friendly content is always subjective and may not correspond to what you want for your child. Therefore, you should look at the offer together with your child beforehand and talk about it.
The older your child is, the more you can let them make the choice on their own. The function of being able to watch the selected music afterwards gives you the possibility to keep an overview of the child’s media usage. However, it can also make your child feel controlled by you. Therefore, it is better to ask your son or daughter directly what they listen to and like. It is also a great experience to listen to music or stories together.
Here are the instructions on how to set up Spotify Kids.
This digital listening pen – the successor to the TING pen – wants to do more than just read aloud, but offers a recording function so children can get creative themselves and also functions as an MP3 player.
The digital audio pen BOOKii is designed to help children discover books with all their senses. The principle that when illustrations and texts in media designed for the pen are tapped with the tip of the pen, dialogues, sounds and information are heard is common to all listening pens. Texts can be read aloud or you can get active yourself with interactive search and knowledge games.
The range of compatible books and games is constantly being expanded. So far, there are around 50 titles from various publishers. The popular WAS IST WAS? series is available for the BOOKii, as are language learning books from Langenscheidt.
Since the pen has a recording function, other books can also be expanded with read-aloud elements. The BOOKii comes with stickers that can be reloaded over and over again with your own recordings. For selected products for older readers, BOOKii – via a Bluetooth connection with a cell phone, tablet or PC – leads to videos or further links on the topic. The function as an MP3 player and the possibility to connect headphones also make the BOOKii attractive as a multifunctional digital listening pen.
It is exciting for children to experience the information they find in a book in different ways. If, for example, it is not only explained how the call of an owl sounds, but an audio example can also be played, this is an exciting reading experience for children.
The recording function and the associated stickers make the pen special. Children can record things themselves, sing or make sounds and add stickers with their recordings. These stickers can be stuck almost anywhere: in the favorite book, on the family calendar or in the school notebook of the sister.
With the successor model to its TING pen, Tessloff Verlag is focusing entirely on interactivity and openness. In addition, during the production process attention was paid to health and the environment: The BOOKii case is made of food-safe material and can be used even by small children. The packaging of the hearing pen and the case are produced in Germany and are recyclable.
Already in its first years, BOOKii received several nominations for prestigious game awards. The justifications emphasize that the pen promotes children’s auditory skills and that small guessing games train concentration.
Tessloff itself highlights the many possible applications for different ages, the possible promotion of language development and children’s cognitive abilities. Thus, according to the manufacturer, the hearing pen is also suitable for use in kindergartens, schools and other educational institutions.
Even if the operation seems child’s play, discover the listening pen and what can be done with it together with your child. There are a number of BOOKii starter packages for different age groups. They usually include a book, the pen with case and recording stickers.
If you want to discover a children’s book with the BOOKii, the associated files must be installed on the pen. To do this, it is best to connect the hearing pen to a PC or laptop. Connection and charging cables are included.
Find out what else is important about using listening pens in the family in our article “Using listening pens for an interactive reading experience“.
