Fantomen Kids is an initiative released in May 2019 to promote the Phantom to school aged kids (mainly targeting 8-12 year old’s) in Sweden, by Fantomen comic’s publishing house parent company, Story House Egmont. The initiative is still in existence to this day.
‘Serier i Undervisningen’ which translates to ‘Series in Teaching’ is run by Story House Egmont, an initiative to promote reading and improved reading comprehension among Swedish school children. Story House Egmont offers high-quality and easily accessible teaching material, making it easy for schools, teachers and educators to utilize the material as part of an educational program. Most teaching material is offered either free of charge or heavily discounted, with other in-class initiatives on offer by ‘Series in Teaching’ creators.
Story House Egmont is part of the Nordic media group and the Egmont Foundation, which annually distributes millions of dollars to help vulnerable children and young people.
‘Series in Teaching’ describe the Fantomen Kids initiative in the following manner:
In Phantom Kids, we get to follow the Phantom’s two children, the twins Kit and Heloise, as they train to one day take over the role of the 22nd Phantom. We also meet the new character Ituri, the long female band, who becomes the twins’ coach. She trains them not only physically, but also in empathy. Kit and Heloise have to face thieves, monsters and poachers and together they have to solve the dangerous situations they end up in, without their dad’s help!
‘Phantom Kids – Kit & Heloise on Adventure’ is the title of a softcover album published by Egmont Publishing in 2019, containing 68 full color pages, measuring 21.5cm x 28.5cm. The album contains 3 comic strip stories, all created specially for the album, with a focus on the Phantoms kids, Kit and Heloise, who are destined to eventually be the 22nd Phantom.
The 3 stories found within the album are:
- Kit and Heloise on Adventure – written by Jens Hansegård and illustrated by Jan Bielecki
- The Monster Within Us – written by Jens Hansegård and illustrated by Jan Bielecki
- Dread of the Poacher- written by Mikael Sol and illustrated by Jan Bielecki
A teachers activity pack has also been created by Emanuel Gustafsson (a primary school teacher from the Jönköping municipality in Sweden), for Story House Egmont, to accompany the above album. The 14 page activity pack is offered free of charge by Egmont, designed to assist teachers in promoting and developing reading skills amongst their pupils, via various writing and drawing tasks.
The cover page of the activity pack can be seen below.
A sample of internal pages.
The Phantom 