Boys and girls these days are a lot more involved in updating their face book profile than in actually sticking their faces into a book. If it doesn’t connect to the power grid and add to the monthly electrical cost, lots of young people are just not that into it. Multi-tasking seems to be the order of the day, so long as none of the tasks include anything remotely important. But, as you know, our traditions is really a significant thing for them have. It just helps being familiar with the stories of how things came to be. If we’re going to remain a successful country we really need to pass on some of our vibrant traditions to them. So how can we get around their reluctance to learning about the dead bones of the past? Toy trains can put our children on the track to becoming more culturally and historically literate. Yes. Yeah, historic model locomotives embody a beautiful history with them but don’t burden us with feeling that we are being educated. Here’s how to teach our traditions with model trains:
Incorporate history into the toy locomotive lay outs that you create with your boys and girls:
If you’ve already gotten your boys and girls interested in model locomotives, a great second step is to make a model locomotive set-up that accurately depicts a exact period and location. For example, let’s say that you decide to show the American Southwest in the period just after the Civil War. You can feign ignorance and get your boys and girls to “help” you figure out what would make for correct scenic details to your setup. They might read about the telegraph and add telegraph lines next to the tracks. A ghost town that failed to benefit on the railroad because it didn’t get a stop might be shown tantalizingly close to the track. Maybe even put in a representative robber baron surveying his train empire.
Historic toy locomotives are also a good alternative to the usual diorama or scale model:
You might also manage to talk your kid’s history teacher into allowing him to bring in a historic toy train lay out in place of the usual boring diorama. You will need to set it up on a portable table and possibly help your child bring it in on the day that it is due, but the combination of historic detail and the interest that such locomotives foster simply on their own are likely to really go over well. Just imagine, for example, adding a model locomotive display to your kid’s essay on Jesse James. As your period specific train rounds the curve there are Jesse and his whole gang just waiting to attack and continue his wrong headed crusade. It’s sure to be a success!
Visit a toy locomotive Museum:
There are also a few toy locomotive museums and other locomotive related historic sites where you can see historic toy trains and some real trains as well. If your local historic train site doesn’t have model locomotives consider suggesting they find some to the curator or manager of the site. In some places, model train societies often put on toy train events.. Just keep your ears pricked and you are sure to come across one sooner or later.
Whatever you choose to do, you will find that model locomotives are a door to the past even if you don’t explicitly use them as such. Just being familiar with different varieties of trains gets us one step closer to understanding their development and the great our traditions that goes with it.
Here is more information on Model Steam Trains. Here is a website with a free mini-course dedicated to Model Trains.
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