Choo! Choo! A Train Unit Study

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Learning to Read with Train Books

Have you ever stood near a railroad track and watched a train? Trains are fascinating. They seem to be going so slowly at first and then faster and faster as they get closer. No matter what age you are, everyone loves trains.

As your child chugs along the way to reading, trains, train books and other train related activities can help him or her acquire the skills needed to become avid readers and lifelong learners.

Start with the Train book by Chris L. Demarest (downloadable from MobiStories) and follow the train tracks to fun and learning...

Train Table of Contents 

An American Classic

An American Classic
Xaras
Buy at AllPosters.com



Who doesn't love to watch trains go by?.

When my child was young his passion was trains. He loved to play with toy trains, watch trains and read train books. He could stand by the train track all day just watching the trains. The book Train by Chris L. Demarest was his favorite.

Watching the Train

Train 

by Chris L. Demarest

Train by Chris L. Demarest

Train LapbookDo you have a train lover in the house? Train is a cute little board book that is simple and sturdy for the youngest train lover but also a great beginning reader for the children just taking off on the road to reading.

Train is written in large print with very few words on each page. It is one of those rare books that appeal to adults as well as children.

Now Train not only comes in paperback or board book form, it also comes in downloadable digial form making it possible to play it on your iPhone, iPod or any Mp3 player.
MobiStories: Digital Books for Children
A Library in your pocket.

Books about Trains 

Reading a Train book Reading Train Books

Photo Credit: Reading The Polar Express
on Flickr, Creative Commons.



These are my children's favorite train books. Most of them are written with large print and have predictable story lines.

Train Art:

For the artistic train lovers, the artwork in Freight Train inspires experimentation with the technique the illustrator used to show the motion of the train.

Try painting the train cars in thin tempra or water colors and when still wet run a dry brush across them.

Another possibility would be to draw them in washable markers, spray the paper with water and then run the dry brush across them.

Either way it gives the illusion of motion.

Freight Train

Color Words:

Using two copies of Freight Train, post each page in a sequence and the children will be able to use them to help in spelling the color words.

Wooden Train Sets 

and their Educational Value

Wooden Trains

At first, wooden trains my seem like just toys, but there is educational value here as well.

1. Putting together the wooden tracks with their peg-and-hole method to connect the tracks make construction and deconstruction as easy and helps with spacial relations.

2. Moving the trains along the track provide fine motor skills which will later be used to write letters.

3. The magnets that hold the cars together provide experiences in magnetism which leads to scientific understanding of physics.

4. Discussions of why people commute by train or transport goods by train leads to a better understanding of social issues and transportation.

If you are looking into getting a train set for you child you can't beat the wooden ones. They are sturdy and very unlikely to break. Though they are not meant for children who still put things in their mouths they are perfect for the 3+ crowd.

Train Track Words 

Preschool Educational activities to extend the MobiStories learning experiences:

Capitalize on your child's love of Buses, Trains and other vehicles by teaching the letters using the toys he or she loves.

Letter Tracks

You can use wooden train tracks to form the letters in the word train. Then encourage your child to drive the train on the track while making the sound of each letter.

Soon you may find that your child will start to pick out the letters when reading the word Train.

Spelling Car 

Trains for Spelling

This cute little Train car helps your child learn short simple words with short vowels.

Spelling Car

The spelling car is perfect for working on the first small words with short vowels. It can be carried along wherever you go or ride along the tracks with the other Brio or Thomas cars.

Help your child first to learn each of the letter sound individually. Teach the short vowel sounds rather than the names of the letters. Then help your child put the sounds together to form words.
Spelling Car My Train
Maple Landmark's wooden train tracks and cars are compatible in size to most other wooden railway systems such as Brio® and Thomas the Tank®.

Reading Aloud to Your Child

Research and practice show that one simple activity - reading aloud - is the best way to prepare children for learning to read and to keep them reading as they learn and grow. -Reading is Fundamental

MobiStories read to your child when you can't.

Train Cars 

Learning to read with Train Cars

Aquarium Cars

Individual Train Cars can be educational . The Milk Car has the word milk written in bold letters. I like the fact that it is the generic word milk rather than promoting a brand. It is a much more useful word for a child to learn.

When playing with the milk car you might discuss how milk comes from cows, the same cows that call Moo out to the Train in the MobiStories Train Book.

The Aquarium cars are filled with a non-toxic liquid and includes a moving octopus or shark inside. You might attach a stickers below the aquarium on the black bed with the word fish written on them.

Having a print rich environment has been proven to help in reading acquisition.

Train Lapbook 

Train Unit Study Portfolio

Lapbooks are a great way to organize the information that you have learned in your unit study. Here are some Train themed lapbooks.

Train Lapbook

Train lapbook

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Train Lapbooks 

Keeping Track of Your Train Unit Study

Train Lapbook

From library books to Lapbooks, and on to MobiStories, reading is the best way to prepare our children to become avid readers and lifelong learners.
Train books for Preschoolers
Recommended by the San Mateo County Library
Train Lapbook
Home + school = life is good: The Silver Package
Trains Lapbook
Caleb shows off his Trains Lapbook.

The Short Vowel Christmas Train Bulletin Board 

Christmas Train Ideas

Christmas Train Bulletin Board

The Christmas Train is coming. Each of the cars are filled with toys who's names have short vowels.

The first car holds toys with a short a sound.
The second car holds toys with a short e sound. etc.

Make the cars from small cereal boxes.
Write the vowel on the front of each car.
Cut out and laminate pictures from used phonics books.
Attach the pictures to Popsicle sticks.

Children put the toys in the right cars.

Hooked on Phonics: Beginning Words

Amazon Price: (as of 12/19/2009) Buy Now

Train 

Chris L. Demarest's well chosen words evoke the sounds and sights of riding a train. They invite the reader to bounce a toddler on the knee while reading and pointing to the boldly colored pictures.

Clickity ClackTrain chugs,
Clickity-clack
Engine up front
Caboose in back

Pass farms
Cows moo
Over hills
Choo! Choo!

Some of the older wooden tracks have grooves in them which make the Clickity Clack sounds.
MobiStories
Clickity ClackDownload Train by Chris L. Demarest and let your child listen the words of the story while he or she watches the pictures and and sees the words as they are spoken.

Read to Your Child 

MibiStories Read to Your Child When You Can't

Reading with MomMobistories Read to Your Child

Have you ever been reading to your child when the phone rang? A very important call was coming in and you needed to speak to the person immediately.

Stories by well-known authors, such as Chris L. Demarest, are now downloadable. Just pull your iPod out of your pocket and hand your child his favorite story, Train already downloaded and waiting to read to him while you finish your call and can focus your attention on him again.
National Center for Family Literacy
Reading together is magical. As you discover adventures between the covers of a book, you also discover things about each other. And with every page you turn, your child expands vocabulary, comprehension, reasoning, grammar and other skills.

Pick up and Put away the Train Set 

Clean up Transition Time

Transition

When it's time to clean up and you need to go out, having a wooden train table with drawers underneath for storage makes clean up quick and easy.

I have one drawer labeled tracks and the other labeled train cars to add to the print rich environment.

The act of sorting the tracks from the train cars is an early math skill leading up to sets, addition and eventually multiplication.

Picking up the Train Set 

Wooden Trains

Getting your child to come away from the train, however, could be a lot more difficult.

As we all know, fighting with a toddler never works but turning it into a game does. I like to sing song such as:

Clean UpClean-up Song

Clean-up, clean-up
Everybody get some toys.
Clean-up, clean-up
All the little girls and boys.
Clean-up, clean-up
Everybody do your share.
Clean-up, clean-up
Everybody, everywhere.

Train 

by Chris L. Demarest

Listening to a StoryThen offer a special treat such as listening to a favorite Train story on your iPod or other Mp3 device. MobiStories make those few minutes when you can't focus on your child a wholesome learning experience.

MobiStories are stories that you read to your child anyway but in a format ideal for when driving in the car, in line at the bank or unloading grocery carts.
MobiStories
Train by Chris L. Demarest

Download Train by Chris L. Demarest
Preschool Nursery Rhymes for Transition Times
Early childhood songs, action poems and fingerplays that help preschool children ease into activities.

Ship by Chris L. Demarest on Youtube 

Another look at Mobistories

Ship, along with Bus, Plane, and Train are the four Transportation books written by Chris L. Demarest. The following is a pre-view of Ship.

Ship www.MobiStories.com

A child describes all the sights and sounds experienced by a ship on a day at sea. Easy to read text and bright, bold illustrations combined with a child's narration, sound effects and fun music.

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Trains, Trains and more Trains 

Boyhood Dreams

Boyhood Dreams
Rockwell, Norman
Buy at AllPosters.com

Which kinds of Trains would your child like ?

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A train and a train story.

A train story and a train.

ElizabethJeanAllen says:

I no longer have small kids in the house (except for my husband.) He has a set of American Flyers running across the top of our entertainment center.

 

Trains on Ebay 

Christmas TrainReading a Train Book

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eBay

Trains and Train Books for the Train Literacy Bag 



Train by Chris L. Demarest

Literacy Bags are fun ways to help parents to connect with the themes being taught in schools. These bags generally have several stories, both fiction and non-fiction, a stuffed animal and several suggested activities. A journal comes with each literacy bag to record the adventures of the stuffed animal while visiting each home. Parents, with the help of their children, write in the journal for children who are not yet able to.

ABC Train Literacy Bag 

ABC Train

Pick both a fiction and non-fiction book, a couple of ABC activities, an ABC floor puzzle and a related plush animal to go in your Literacy Bags. Include a journal to record the adventures of your stuffed animal. Literacy Bags connect the theme being studied at school with home and allow children to share their learning experiences with their families.

Homeschoolers often share Literacy Bags between families. Some Public Libraries are beginning to have Literacy Bags which can be checked out.
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Train Phonics 

Train Coloring Page

This coloring page of a train would be good for writing the words your child discovers on the Spelling Train Car (above). Write one letter on each of the three cars.

Make extra copies for each word.

Cut out the trains and help your child put the cars in ABC order.

Line the trains up along the chair rail and practice reading them.

Talk about what each train could be hauling. The what kinds of hats might the HAT TRAIN be carrying and where might the train be coming from and going to.

Children that have already learned the short vowels and are ready to go on to the long vowels will enjoy -Ain as in Train which helps to introduce the long a in -ain.

Ain As in Train (Word Families Set 8)

Introduces the use of the letter combination "ain" in such words as "train," "sprain," "chain," and "brain."

Amazon Price: $19.93 (as of 12/19/2009) Buy Now

Train related Lenses 

Train

Riding on the Traintracks 

Looking For The Moon - Tom Paxton

Listen to the beat of Tom Paxton's music which resembles the beat of the train rolling down the tracks.
powered by Youtube

Father's Christmas Train Puzzle 

Trains for Christmas

Christmas Train

MibiStories can read a Train story to your child while you finish putting the puzzle together.

Use the picture in the puzzle to start a conversation with your child about trains. Make up stories about what the father and son will do next.
Father's Christmas Train Puzzle
While Dad is playing with the Train, his son is reading about trains.

Model Trains 

Model Trains

Learn all about the hobby of Model Trains and how to make authentic scenery for your model village.

More MobiStories like Bus are waiting for you: 

Watching the Christmas Train

How do you use a train theme to teach children? 

Train by Chris L. Demarest

MobiStories don't take away from reading the actual books, they actually enhance the experience. You can even try one out for free. I wasn't convinced at first that I could endorse them as I tend to stay away from technology for children but I have found that these downloadable stories truly encourage reading of the real book. I hope you check them out.

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Meet the Author of this Lens 

Evelyn's Hands-On Learning Blog.

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Christmas TrainFind out what I'm thinking about when I'm riding a train:

by Evelyn_Saenz

My passion is teaching and finding ways to teach children in fun, hands-on, creative ways. The unit studies I make on Squidoo reflect my view that lea... (more)

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