Vroom vroom! There are lots of busy construction vehicles at the construction site! The dump truck is an important construction truck that moves heavy material like dirt, gravel and sand from one place to another. When it gets to where it needs to go, the back of the dump truck tilts backwards and dumps everything out! Make your very own dump truck that can dump construction material with our dump truck craft! As you put your dump truck together, you’ll learn about the different parts of this special construction vehicle. Vroom vroom! Once you finish, try making our excavator craft to help out around the construction site.
Things you’ll need
- Construction paper in a few different colors. We used yellow, black and blue.
- Tape
- Marker
- Glue stick
- Round head fasteners
- Hole punch
- Ruler
- Bottle cap or something circular to trace to make the wheels. Ours was 2” wide.
- White colored pencil crayon – to trace onto the black paper
We’ll be making these parts of the dump truck:
- Chassis
- Wheels
- Dump box
- Cab
Make the chassis and wheels of your truck
The chassis is the bottom part of the truck that houses the wheels and connects all the truck parts together. To make the chassis, use a ruler and draw a long rectangular shape on black construction paper. Our chassis is about a 10” by 2” rectangle. Use something circular like a bottle cap and trace three circles onto black on construction paper for the wheels. Our wheels were 2” wide.
Make the dump box
The dump box holds materials like dirt, sand and gravel, it’s a very important part of the dump truck! To make the dump box, draw a large rectangular shape onto a yellow piece of construction paper. Our dump box was about 4” by 8”. Make sure your dump box will fit on your chassis and that your chassis still has enough room for the rest of the dump truck! At the back of the dump box draw a slightly angled line with a lip at the top. This is where the door opens when the dump box rises and dumps everything out! You can draw a small square on your yellow paper to be a window for the cab part of the truck.
Make the cab
The cab is where the driver sits, and the engine and hood are at the front of the cab. You can make your cab be any color you like! We used blue. To make the cab, draw a square onto your construction paper. We made ours 4” by 4”. Then divide your square into four small squares, and cut away one quarter from the square to make the cab shape. Round off the corners to make smooth corners.
Get ready to cut out all of the shapes! Use your scissors and cut them out.
Now it’s time to assemble all the pieces of your dump truck! Using your glue stick, glue the cab onto the chassis and then glue on the wheels. Glue one wheel under the cab and two more at the back – they will be under the dump box. Glue on your square window onto the cab so your driver can look out!
Position and place your dump box onto the chassis, then at the back of the dump box, make a hole with a hole punch that goes through both the dump box and the chassis. Connect the two pieces with a round head fastener so the dump box can tilt backwards and dump things out!
Now you can make some material for the dump truck to move and dump out. Draw and cut some dumping material like dirt, gravel, or sand.
Turn your dump truck over, and on the back of the dump box, make a pocket to hold your dumping material. Cut out a rectangle from construction paper and attach it to the dump box using a piece of tape on both sides. Don’t make the pocket too deep, otherwise the material won’t slide out easily.
Your dump truck is ready to move move move and help out all over your construction site!
Watch Caitie make this craft in the classroom during the episode Construction Trucks!
Try making our excavator craft to go along with your dump truck!
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