Activities for Your Train Enthusiast Toddler

Trains are big, powerful, recognizable, and make cool noises - what could be more appealing to a little boy? Just about every little guy goes through a train stage - I'm not sure that ours will ever end! My son engages in pretend-play with his 3 little wooden trains (no track) more than any of his other toys, sometimes for nearly an hour at a time, but boredom still sneaks up on him every once in a while and it has been a fun challenge to find other train-themed activities to grab his interest. Here are some of the things we've come up with:

Take a Trip: We are fortunate enough to live very near a train station and hear the trains go buy multiple times a day. The (very small) station is within walking distance, so about once a week - rain or shine - we bundle up if necessary and walk down to watch the trains for an hour or so. I'm excited that this Summer he will be old enough to enjoy bringing a picnic basket and blanket with us . There is a little park/green area right next to a decommissioned old red caboose. They also have a little train museum that has limited hours and is currently under renovation. Do some research to find out if there is anything similar in your area, or even a park near you that has train tracks within sight. We even make a point of leaving a few minutes early for activities and sometimes taking the long way to cross a set of tracks and hope that we get stopped by a train crossing. We love to count the cars, name the colors, and talk about what the train could be transporting.

Visit a Museum: I mentioned the little museum at our station, but most large cities have a central station (like Union Station here in Kansas City) with a museum, and many have one or more transportation museums as well. On a recent trip to Denver, Colorado we stopped off at the Forney Museum of Transportation and were pleasantly surprised by multiple locomotives on display - we were even able to board a few! The gift shop also had a few working model train tables that kept him interested almost as long as the museum did!

Crafts and Coloring Pages: You'll find numerous train coloring pages with a simple google search. I buy myself a few extra minutes after breakfast every once in a while by printing a sheet to give to him while he is still seated as soon as I clear the table. You can see some of our favorite print-outs here and here. We have also enjoyed finding ways to use every day object like toilet paper rolls to create our own (cheap if not indestructible) trains like these and these.

Books: Our libraries offer something called "book bundles" that are 2 or 3 easy reader books on the same theme, "bundled" together with a rubber band and set aside in a special place in the library. We love when a train themed bundle shows up. We'll pick up any train book, but there are always dozens of Thomas the Train books on the shelves, and my son now knows to make a bee-line to the magazine section to pick up the trade magazine called TRAINS. He loves thumbing through it and it has been a good way to teach him how to gently turn pages. Our library keeps outdated copies and even allows patrons to "check them out." My husband is a librarian and has assured me that they aren't overly concerned about getting them returned in the same condition if at all. They don't even scan them, they just ask that we let them know when we are taking one.

Videos: Everyone knows about Thomas. We've enjoyed a few episodes on DVD from the library, but there are many other good options out there, too. Disney has a fun new series called Chuggington that my son really enjoys. There are always a few episodes on their website. We have memorized which episodes of his other favorite shows incorporate trains also. The Little Einsteins episode, "The Great Sky Race Rematch" has Rocket turn into a train. The Blue's Clues episode, "Blues Baby Brother" has the characters traveling on a train to find the clues for the day. And when he was younger, we really enjoyed the Baby Einsteins video, "Numbers Nursery" because the numbers they are learning (1-5) are pulled around on a little toy train. Our all time favorite trains to watch, however, are not in toddler shows at all. We love the YouTube series "Trains Across America." There are over 20 episodes made by model train aficionados from all over the country. The videos are usually between 5-10 minutes long and are slow moving and informative. He could watch all of the episodes in a row - and I don't mind having them playing in the background while I work!

Pretend Play: If you look in the photos to the side of this article, you'll see that my son loves using other objects as trains. In fact, he calls his wooden blocks "choo choos" more often than blocks! He asks us to get down on the floor with him multiple times every day to make track and tunnels ("arches") with his blocks. He then uses the long flat blocks as trains. We play trains with our food, with our crayons, and in boxes that we line up on the floor. He's a great conductor. :)

Room Décor: If we could afford them, we would love to pick up some removable wall decals and window clings for him to play with. We can't, so we made our own using scrapbooking and contact paper. We printed this train out as a template and traced it onto colorful paper, then cut all but the middle rectangle off and made 5 "train cars" to write each letter of his name on. We then covered them front and back with clear contact paper and put double sided tape on the back so he can stick them wherever he'd like. I can also imagine this making an adorable room border or alphabet banner. Scroll through our photos to see how ours turned out!

Potty Training and Incentive Charts: We used this potty training chart when we started the process with our son and it was a hit! We moved on to this one with more spaces when he got the hang of it - just the fact that there was a picture of Thomas in the corner was enough for him! We also purchased Thomas the train underwear. You could easily make your own train chore charts or sticker charts with any printable coloring page.

Do you have favorite train-themed activities or toys to share?