Pajama Press

Dump Truck, Dump Truck
Coming through!
I spy a triangle—how about you?  

It’s no secret that toddlers of any gender love big vehicles. Shape Up, Construction Trucks! uses rhyming verse and bright photographs to celebrate this enthusiasm in a unique take on conceptual shape books. Each spread highlights geometric shapes hiding in plain sight on excavators, bulldozers, cranes, and more. And after the toddlers have browsed the pages to their heart’s content, a final note to parents offers enriching, age-appropriate activities to keep building their child’s foundational skills.

By kindergarten, most children should have developed the spatial sense to identify shapes in real-world environments. Shape recognition lays the foundation not only for geometry, but for learning to recognize letters and numbers as well. With repetitive, easy-to-remember verse from the award-winning author of Nat the Cat Can Sleep Like That, Victoria Allenby’s Shape Up, Construction Trucks! is a highly visual shape book that digs deep.

Awards and Honours:
2022 Mathical Book Prize Honor Book
School Library Journal blogger Elizabeth Bird’s “2020 Math Books for Kids” selection
2020 CBC Books “52 Canadian picture books coming out in fall 2020” selection
2021 CCBC Spring Best Books for Kids & Teens selection

Reviews:
★ “Storytime gets a kick in the pants with this jaunty combo of shapes and vehicles….Clear, crisp, clean, and concise—trucks and shapes have never before looked (or sounded) this good.”—Kirkus Reviews ★ Starred Review

★ “Large photos, bold type, and color-specific shapes serve as wonderful aids for young readers to strengthen their identification skills….Sure to be a hit with collections and storytimes.”—School Library Journal ★ Starred Review

“Allenby’s book is almost too good for its very simple premise….As the Kirkus review pointed out, you could do a whole storytime and sing this book to the “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” song and make a whole construction production out of it!”—Elizabeth Bird, A Fuse #8 Production

“Combining these two concepts – construction and shapes – is a novel idea and is effective at building vocabulary in both areas….Shape Up, Construction Trucks! is a simple book executed well.”—CM Magazine

“This book covers so many different topics all in one book!…The book allows a parent to increase the difficulty of the book based on the readers reading level at the time….What I love the most about this book is at the end it gives parents different ways to read through the book. That is so helpful for parents who are often looking to get the most for their dollar on every item they purchase for a child.”—Youth Services Book Review

“This fun picture books uses the interest that many children have in construction equipment to teach them about shapes….I always love picture books that combine fun and learning and this is a good example.”—Canadian Bookworm

“A bright, bold, and fun story…With a terrifically clean and clever layout relying on rhyme and repetition, each page spread focuses on introducing one truck and one shape…Likely to be a hit during read aloud time and/or with readers who adore anything related to trucks or construction vehicles…”—Fab Book Reviews