Storytime Anytime-Chugga Chugga Choo Choo

In my last post, Choo Choo Read, I reviewed two children's chapter books that are set on trains. Since I currently have "trains on the brain" what could be better than a railway storytime?

Before we head to storytime I want to talk about potty training. Every parent's favorite topic (NOT)!!!  Having successfully gotten three children out of diapers the most important piece of advice that I can give you is to keep your sense of humor. Especially with boys, because let me tell you they just do not seem to care if they are stinky and dirty (and does that ever really change?). What does any of this have to do with trains. Well, forget Everyone Poops and Once Upon a Potty, the best and most hilarious book for toilet training is The Potty Train by David Hochman and Ruth Kennison. All you have to do is look at the cover to know that it is going to be ridiculously funny. If my boys ever read this post they will be mortified, but I clearly remember the calls of "Chugga Chugga Poooooo Pooooooo" emanating from the bathroom.

Ok, from here on out it will just be trains without potties. Kate and Jim McMullen are the author and illustrator of multiple picture books about vehicles: I Stink, I'm Mighty, I'm Dirty, etc. I'm Fast is about a freight train that is determined to beat a speedy race car to Chicago despite cows, mountains, and even a blizzard. Jim McMullen's illustrations are bright, colorful, and captivating no matter what age you are. There is a wonderful rhythm to the text and, of course, it features lots of sound effects for preschoolers to join in on.


Freight Train by Donald Crews also features very bold and graphic illustrations, but it is much more simplistic. This Caldecott honor book only has a few words per page describing the the color and type of train car and where the train is traveling.
I am not one for "techie" things but Freight Train is available for the Nook complete with sound effects and there is also an iphone/ipad app.

You can make your own Freight Train cars using simple rectangles of colored construction paper and black circles for wheels. There are also lots of Freight Train printables available online.

My youngest son has never been one to sit and do crafts (or sit still for much of anything). He did love to act the story out using the Duplo train cars which we had a ton of.

We also had some of these little vehicle counters which you can buy in school supply stores or online. They are small so if you have little ones that like to put things in their mouths you will want to watch them carefully.

How can we make trains even more appealing to little boys (and girls for that matter)? Add dinosaurs of course! As you can see in addition to dinosaurs on trains, Lund has also written about dinosaurs on boats and planes (that sounds like a Dr. Seuss rhyme). All three of these are available on Tumblebooks. The link that I have provided goes straight to the page with All Aboard the Dinotrain, just scroll down and hit the read online button.

If you have young kids and have never looked at Tumblebooks, you need to check it out. Just go to the library website, www.pdl.michlibrary.org, and click on the Tumblebooks icon.
This is a website that the library subscribes to for our patrons. There are oodles of children's ebooks: picture books, chapter books, fiction, and nonfiction. Kids can have the books read to them and follow along or they can read on their own. Many of the books also have related puzzles and activities.

After sitting still and listening to stories, many kids will be ready to move around. My favorite train song with motions is Pufferbillies. If you don't know this song, I love the Wiggles version. My daughter watched and listened to the Wiggles so much as a toddler (it was the only way she would ride in the car without crying) we were sure that she was going to start talking with an Australian accent. Here is the video of the Wiggles singing the Pufferbillies:

You will notice that I did not mention The Little Engine that Could which is probably the most famous train picture book. I'm sorry if you love this one but I always found the clown in that book to be petrifying.

Is that Pennywise riding that train?