Without a doubt, most of these offerings aren't the latest New York Times bestsellers, but they do include many books that high school students are still required to read, or can be used to entice them to read the great classics once presented in "mp3-player" form. And, I'm sure you'll find plenty for yourself here, as well!

First, head on over to the "Audio Books and Poetry" section of the Internet Archive where you'll find many files and links to books that are in public domain. One such link is the Globe Radio Repertory, which houses radio productions dating back to the early 1980s, bringing Don Quixote, Madame Bovary, Flaubert, and stories by Checkhov. There's also a link to take you to Project Gutenberg, which has a large collection of their books in audio format. Some are read by humans and some are read by computers (personally, those don't work for me at all). You can easily see the entire audio collection read by humans by going here.

One of my favorite projects on the Internet is LibriVox, where public domain books are read by volunteers. LibriVox's goal is to "make all public domain books available as free audio books." They accept books in all languages and volunteering couldn't be easier. According to the site: "You do not need any prior experience to volunteer for LibriVox, nor do you need to audition or send us samples. All you need is your voice, some free software, your computer, and maybe an inexpensive microphone." You don't need to read an entire book, either! Chapters are usually made up of many different readers. Not ready to volunteer? There are almost 2,000 books waiting for you to download. You can get them in .mp3 or .ogg file formats. Selected recordings of books, short stories, and poetry can be subscribed to through an RSS feed (in iTunes, for instance, in separate feeds for each category) and LibriVox offers a strong support forum and a community podcast of the happenings at the site, technical advice, interviews with readers and listeners, etc.

LoudLit.org has plenty of public domain books and many are in audio form. You have the option of downloading just the .mp3 audio or listening to the reading on a Web page that also contains text, perfect for struggling readers needing audio support. Lit2Go, out of Florida, has a huge collection and can be accessed from the Web site with accompanying text (in pdf form) or in iTunes. You can search by author, title, keyword, or reading level on the website or browse the collection categorized by grade level within iTunes.

Looking for newer content than the classics? OpenCulture has an entire selection dedicated to free audio book offerings, sometimes including more recent publications. It was here that I learned that Neil Gaiman is releasing video of each chapter of his new book, The Graveyard Book, captured from his book tour. OpenCulture also has a page with a huge compilation of links for free book downloads, again offering the classics.

Also, don't forget that Audible and LearnOutLoud.com, both offer some free content alongside their priced offerings. On Audible, you have to hunt for the free files, but here's a direct link to free books on LearnOutLoud.com.

So when assigning the classics to students, make sure you offer the audio-flavor books as well. Your students who need extra support with the text will thank you, you'll fill up iPods with great literature, and you may even find something for yourself that you have time to listen to during your daily commute.

Bob Sprankle has been a multi-age teacher in Wells, ME for 10 years and has served as the school's Technology Integrator for the past two years.

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