Here's a great activity that would go well with the Polar Express if you are doing anything with that! First we cut 12" X 18" gray construction paper in half to make it 6" X 18". Then they drew two horizontal parallel lines and lots of vertical lines to make the tracks.
Ahead of time I cut 2" squares for the engine, and cut a 1" square out of one corner. I also cut a small window and triangle for the front of the engine. In addition I cut LOTS of 1" squares for the cars, and two different size circles for the wheels. I just colored the smoke stack with a Sharpie for the engine, instead of cutting out construction paper.
My students wrote the first letter of their name on the engine (capital letter) and then we counted how many cars they would need for the rest of their name and they wrote one lower case letter on each car. Using glue sponges, they glued the cars and wheels down. Then I drew 3-4 dots where they should glue down their cotton balls. I did this because we've been practicing "a dot, not a lot", so this was the perfect opportunity for them to see about what size glue dot they needed!
Here's a close up of the train I got the inspiration from. I'm sorry I can't give credit to the original poster, but it only links to the image and doesn't have any identifying information.
