Melody Express Musical Train

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I love the concept of the Melody Express Musical Train : A train that chugs along playing music depending on the sequenced tracks that you put together. I could not wait to open it up and share it with both of my sons. And while we all enjoyed it and they played with it for a long time, we came across a few roadblocks here and there. But with focused and imaginative conductors, this train set can be music to your ears after all.

Here is how it works. At first glance, it looks like your average train set. It comes with a train and one extra car, a small conductor, train tracks (about enough to make a medium sized oval on your floor) and quite a few colored tiles. However this train is actually more of a musical instrument. Each of the provided colored tiles represents a note which can fit onto the train track. Once the tiles are lined up on the track, the train will roll along and play the notes that correspond with each tile. The train set also comes with patterns for the tiles so that if they are placed in a certain order, you can hear familiar songs such as "twinkle, twinkle" or "itsy bitsy spider". Or, you can place the tiles in whatever sequence you'd like and enjoy your own made up tune.

Melody Express Musical Train Pros:

My sons (ages 2 and 5) are both enormous train fans so they dove right into this toy. And so did I (I think I was as excited as they were about it). I found myself elbowing them out of the way to set up a pattern to see how it worked. Once everything was placed just so, the train was turned on and a cheer went up as we heard the song play. Then my five year old tried making some patterns himself and was excited when he succeeded. He took great pleasure in covering the entire track in tiles so music played continuously. They truly did have a lot of fun with this train.

Melody Express Musical Train Cons:

A few issues came up however. First of all, this train is suggested for children 3 and over. I would agree whole heartedly - and even suggest not bothering unless your child is at least 4. My two year old watched and enjoyed the songs, but the small tiles were tempting to run off with. They are easy to lose, throw, step on and drop. Also, the tiles take some focused fine motor coordination to place on the tracks. They must lay a certain way in order to play music - and with one small nudge, they can come undone a bit and need fixing. We also discovered that the tiles only work if the train moves clockwise on the track. At times, I found myself hovering and helping now and then before my son got too frustrated (resulting in tiles flying in every direction).

The bottom line is that this is a pretty cool toy for patient kids who are willing to be musically creative with the tiles.

The Melody Express Musical Train passed the most stringent test of all - kid testing. This past year, in time for the holiday season, the prestigious and highly respected Good Housekeeping Institute let loose 43 kids in a lab with 51 toys over three days to get to the best in the bunch. And Melody Express Musical Train made it to the top 14 most safe, creative, and fun finds of 2008.

Selecting the winners of magazine giant Good Housekeeping's first annual Best Toy Awards was serious fun. The Good Housekeeping Institute looked at hundreds of playthings for kids from the ages of 2 to 14, evaluated 51 favorites, and then let dozens of kids make the final cuts.

Melody Express Musical Train from Learning Resources puts an interesting spin on the traditional train set. The new Melody Express can be enjoyed as a simple train track system, with its colorful locomotive and coal tender, but it can also act as a musical instrument thanks to the clever color-coded tiles that can be placed on the tracks.

At first glance, it looks like your average train set. It comes with one train and one extra car, a small conductor, train tracks (about enough to make a medium sized oval on the floor) and quite a few colored tiles. However this train is actually more of a musical instrument. Each of the provided colored tiles represents a note which can fit onto the train track. Once the tiles are lined up on the track, the train will roll along and play the notes that correspond with each tile.

One detail that is worth mentioning is that the tiles only work if the train moves clockwise on the track.

The train set also comes with patterns for the tiles so that if they are placed in a certain order, you can hear familiar songs such as "twinkle, twinkle" or "itsy bitsy spider". Or, you can place the tiles in whatever sequence you'd like and enjoy your own made up tune which gives a whole new meaning to "laying down some new tracks."


A unique melody-building train set invites children to play composer and conductor at the same time. Kids of three and older can experiment with their own music, or use the color-coded song book provided to lay out seven popular tunes.

For a child who aspires to be a conductor of either the locomotive or musical variety, Melody Express Musical Train by Learning Resources is just the ticket. Both parents and teachers tout the Melody Express Musical Train as a great way for kids to explore music, movement and transportation. And it doesn't hurt that kids just find it plain old fun.

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