how do i use an iphone 5 as an ipod

Follow the instructions here: Using an iPhone without a wireless service plan

Lawrence, any idea why this article now has the designation of being "archived" and "no longer updated by Apple"? Is it because there's nothing left to add or update at this point or because it's no longer required to swap SIM cards? (I don't know if that's true just trying to figure it out.)

I didn't take out my wife's original SIM card in turning her iPhone 4s into an iPod Touch for my son and almost everything has gone smoothly except for two things:

• Facetime had a few issues at first but I've straightned them out.
• I still see "activation" error messages after restarting. This I'd like to get ironed out because it's annoying, so is the best course of action still to take out the old SIM, put in the SIM from my wife's new iPhone, restore the old one with new SIM in it, and then once everything is set up correctly return the new sim to the new phone?

I think if I understood more clearly why this SIM swapping is necessary, I would be able to answer some of my own questions.

I'm not sure why it's been archived. Maybe the process has changed. It should only require that a SIM be in the phone; it has to be for the carrier the phone is locked to, but it can be a deactivated SIM.