There are plenty of battery-operated train sets for children on the market. What distinguishes Leap's Phonics Railroad from the rest is its ability to recognize alphabet blocks placed in the train. The motorized train moves along the easy-to-assemble, figure-8 track, singing learning songs, letter names, and letter sounds, depending on which block is placed in its coal car.
The train features familiar characters from the LeapFrog line of toys—at the front is engineer Leap, and Lily and Tad tag along on the back. After placing the train on the track, children can press the GO button to set the train in motion. If they load a block with the letter "F" face up in the coal car, the toy announces the letter's name and phonics sound and then sings a song that reinforces both the name and sound of the letter. Children can manage the train by twisting any of two Railroad Crossing signs so that the train will stop at either the Letter Station or the ABC Construction Site. At the construction site, children are encouraged to pile up letter blocks and use the swiveling wrecking ball to knock them down.
Some of the block faces activate songs, such as "I've Been Working on the Railroad" or the "ABC Song". The songs for the letters are somewhat repetitive—more variety of song styles would have been better. However, they feature pleasing rhymes and attempt to teach children words that start with the featured letter and two different sounds a letter makes (such as "G says 'guh' and 'juh'"), when appropriate. The train announces when it needs adjusting ("We're off the track!"), and parents can adjust the volume to either of two settings.
Although the sound quality is decent, the volume of the music relative to the singing voice affects the clarity of the letter names and sounds. Since the toy is designed for children just learning the alphabet and basic phonics, clarity is especially important. Additionally, we would have preferred a separate button for stopping the train. As it stands, children press the GO button to both start and stop the train. Although children catch on to the concept, a button that clearly reads "stop" would make a little more sense considering the toy's young target age group. More variety in play features would have also boosted the toy's overall value. Leap's Phonics Railroad is attractive and entertaining, however, and the concept of adding educational value to a tried-and-true motorized train set is innovative.
