This post is sponsored by HarperCollins.
Sidekick is going from transitional kindergarten (TK) into kindergarten this year, and I couldn’t possibly be more excited! TK was an amazing opportunity for him to get a jump on school. He knows his first 100 sight words, and he can sound out ones he doesn’t know.
As we gear up for kingergarten, the I Can Read! Books from HarperCollins are helping to solidify his skills. This early-reader series hascolor-coded reading levels and fun characters that your child will recognize. We made this Mighty Truck handprint to get hands-on with his current favorite read.
We actually have a whole pile of these books in the “Shared Reading” level and “Level 1,” since Sidekick is kind of in-between the two skill sets (so much depends on the day, kids’ moods, how recently they napped…). You can learn more about the levels and why to choose I Can Read! here.
Our favorite characters in the I Can Read! books besides Mighty Truck are The Berenstain Bears, Pete the Cat, Danny and the Dinosaur, and the My Community series which features community figures like police officers and doctors.
Mighty Truck is hard to beat, though. He’s a dusty 4-wheeler who gets magically transformed into a “really, wheely powerful superhero” during a truck wash one day. Now, he spends his time alternating between his dusty, disguised form and his shiny, helpful alter ego. Transformation is “only a wash away!”
We thought we’d go ahead and try our hand at a Mighty Truck handprint. Get it? At first I wasn’t sure how we’d turn a hand into a truck, but we rolled with it (man, I am on FIRE with the puns today) and I was SO impressed with how it turned out.
We started with a red handprint, addad a dash of yellow paint for the fender, a blue thumbprint for the eyeball, and then black Sharpie for the eyes and wheels. I finished it off with a tiny little white grin.
I wasn’t sure how to add the “windshield” section, and Sidekick came up with the thumbprint idea on his own. So cute! All you need for this Mighty Truck handprint activity is paper and some paint in red, yellow, blue, black and white colors (or use a Sharpie and white-out for the black and white portions).
Having a character Sidekick loves – like Mighty Truck – really helps get him excited to read his books, and engage with them on fun crafts like this. If you’re like me and always looking to connect reading time with activities, you’ll find all sorts of resources on the I Can Read! website.
Do you have a kid who’s learning to read and getting set for back-to-school? Go check out our post on Instagram for your chance to win a sampling of five I Can Read! books, plus a State Bags backpack.
Are your kids big fans of Mighty Truck?