Things That Go: Clackety-Clack

A National Geographic Level 1 easy reader, Trains by Amy Shields is a nonfiction text composed of episodic chapters full of facts about trains.  Published in 2011, this book teaches its readers about such topics as types of trains and how they run, the history of trains in America, and train sounds  The book contains no recommended reader age. Though the text is marked as a Level 1 reader, a ranking that most publishers use to orient these books toward beginning readers, this particular book would be best suited as an independent read for children who are beginning to develop confidence in their reading skills.  The text provides lots of helpful features for early readers: large typeface, mostly short words and lines, Gary the Engineer’s additional information, “Train Talk” boxes defining words such as “loot” and “turntable,” and phonetic spellings for pronunciation of words like “maharaja” and “diesel.” Another fun feature of the text is the onomatopoeia: train sounds such as “whirrrrr,” clackety-clack,” “woooo-woo,” and “ding-ding-ding” are in different colorful fonts throughout the text, making this book a fun read-aloud option.  However, early readers who are looking to read this book independently may find the layout visually overwhelming, as there is not much white space to speak of. The book is packed instead with color: photos both modern and historic, question and answer boxes, cartoon speech bubbles for Gary the Engineer. While these features are fun and interesting, they may not give an early reader’s eyes much chance to rest. This book would make a wonderful tool for classroom instruction or storytime, but is also a good choice for independent readers.  Not only will this text delight train enthusiasts, but it will also interest children who had not previously been particularly interested in locomotives.