Puff, Puff, Toot Toot

Down by the station by Will Hillenbrand.

This was one of my earliest success stories with Mitchell. As he didn't like being read to, but loved being sung to, I kept my eyes open for illustrated songs; and this was one of the first I came across.

Early in the morning the train travels around the zoo picking up the baby animals to go to the Children's Zoo. So you have the drawcard of cute baby animals as well as the singing.

The illustrations are sufficiently bold to work for large groups of children, with lovely large double page spreads of each stop on the train's journey; and also have lots of interesting detail that Mitchell picked up on after many readings (what the naughty monkey is doing on each page, where is the balloon?, clues to the next animal enclosure on the right of each page page spread, etc.)

My only criticism, is that the scansion of the rhyme is 'off' when each animal is described (there should be 4 syllables, and are only 2), but it's easy enough to add in another descriptive word (sleepy panda, pink chick, seal pup, etc.)

The recommended age range is 4-8 -- but it worked brilliantly for my 18 month old (with Mama turning the pages)

This continues to be a favourite, and is still as beloved well over a year after the first reading.

Of course, I can't actually read this story to Mitchell, I have to sing it!