Learning Your Name Freight Train

It is time for Virtual Book Club for Kids. Our featured author this month is Donald Crews. We picked Freight Train to read and then created a learning your name activity.

Learning Your Name is super fun with this Freight Train inspired activity!

If you are new to Virtual Book Club for Kids here is a little background. The Educators’ Spin On It, Toddler Approved and Rainy Day Mum have put together a wonderful line-up of great authors to explore. On the second Thursday of each month, talented bloggers will be sharing one of the three featured books by the highlighted author that month. Each blogger shares an activity or craft to compliment one of the three books. You are invited to try out as many of the ideas that you feel would be a good fit for your kids.

Now, onto the Donald Crews’ book and activity we chose this month.

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Freight Train Book and Learning Your Name Activity

The Book: Freight Train

Train lovers will enjoy this simple book that also teaches about colors. It’s neat to see the movement of the train through the illustrations as it barrels down the track. Freight Train is a simple book that packs a lot of punch!

Learning Your Name Activity

We often use hands-on activities to help my son learn the letters in his name. Even if you are just working on letter identification, using the letters in your child’s name is the best place to start.

Materials Needed: wooden track and trains, small blocks, sticky notes, markers, construction paper (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple and black)

setting up the learning your name freight train activity

1. Set up your train track and place the train cars on the track.

2. Place enough blocks along the inside of the track to hold each letter of your child’s name.

3. Write each letter of your child’s name on a sticky note. You will need seven sets. Put each letter on a building block.

4. Fold each piece of construction the long way (hot dog fold).

5. If your child need helps ordering the letters in his name, you can write his name on each piece of construction paper.

You are now ready to play and learn.

collecting letters in the learning your name activity

Have your child move the train along the track collecting the letter loads.

building your name

When all letters have been collected, he should deliver them to the color dock (one of the pieces of construction paper). There he will place the sticky notes in the correct order on the paper to spell his nam

Place the next set of sticky notes on the blocks and let your child move the train to collect the next load. Repeat the series above.

Additional Fun

build a learning your name train