McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader, Revised Edition · Lesson LXIX · Part 7: Courage, temper and work

75. The Crazy Engineer

Goal: Your child follows a suspense story, tells it back in order, and notices how the writer builds excitement.

⏱ About 35 minutes · 7 steps

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You'll need

  • The book, open to this lesson
  • A notebook or lined paper and a pencil

What's in the book

A railway story told by an official of a line in Prussia. With no engineer for a late train, he accepts a stranger, Martin Kroller, who turns out to be insane and drives the train at a terrible speed until a student helps stop him. A note says where the story took place.

The lesson, step by step

  1. About the writer

    The book does not name an author for this story. It is told by "I," a man in charge of a train. A note at the end says the incident is said to have happened on a railway in the valley of the Vistula River, in Prussia, between Dantzic and Bromberg.

  2. Words and meanings

    The words and meanings are printed at the end of the lesson. Read a few together before the reading, so they don't trip your child up:

    Competent, fit, qualified.

    Juncture, point of time, crisis.

    Tender, a car attached to a locomotive to supply it with fuel and water.

    Precision, accuracy, exactness.

    Your child reads each meaning aloud, then uses the word in a sentence of their own.

  3. Read aloud

    Your child reads the story aloud. Let the voice speed up and grow tense as the train does. Some lines to listen for:

    "Sir," he gasped, "is Martin Kroller on the engine?"

    I knew that a few more miles per hour would launch us all into destruction.

  4. Talk about it

    SayWhy did the man in charge agree to let a stranger run the engine? Was it a wise choice?

    SayWhen did you first feel that something was wrong? What clues did the writer give?

    SayThe writer tells the story as "I." How does that make it more exciting than if he wrote "he"?

  5. Tell it back

    Close the book.

    SayTell me the story in order: the problem, the stranger, the wild ride and how it ended.

    Older children can write their narration in a short paragraph instead. Don't correct while they talk; just listen.

  6. Dictation

    Read this sentence aloud while your child writes it. Then check it together against the book:

    I knew that a few more miles per hour would launch us all into destruction.

  7. Optional writing

    Your child writes a short news report of the event, as it might have appeared in a paper the next day.

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