Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum.

Today children regard trains as just another not very exciting means of travel, but to many early Victorian people the thought of riding on a train was as alarming and exciting as the idea of space travel is today. To be whisked along at the incredible speed of 30 miles per hour behind a machine belching smoke and soot through tunnels and over bridges was a novel and unsettling experience.