1-2-3 Come Learn About Community Helpers With Me!

For a social studies lesson, many teachers choose to study community helpers. 

I've had quite a few requests for community helper activites, so I decided to design a nice variety of items incorporating the Common Core whenever I could.

To get the ball rolling, I spent a kajillion hours online, at the bookstore and reading at the library, to compile a bibliography of 63 of my favorite Community Helper books.

Summer is the perfect time to add to your classroom library via garage sales, and introducing a unit with books, is a wonderful way to get children excited.

Click on the link to view/download the Community Helpers bibliography.

I also wanted to make an alphabetical list of all the community helpers/occupations I could think of, so that students could make an ABC booklet, ask about community helpers and jobs that they were not familiar with, and use the list to do a variety of writing activities, including what they'd like to be when they grow up.

From astronauts to zookeepers, I came up with a list of over 300 community helpers/occupations.

Click on the link to view/download the alphabetical list of community helpers/occupations.

I love dj Inkers artwork and am thrilled to have her permission to use it to design lessons for you. She has a variety of licenses available.

Her community helpers, done with bears, were perfect to make picture word cards, that can be used for your word wall or pocket chart.

I've included a 3-page tip list of what else you can use the cards for, including writing prompts, puzzles and games.

There are also several booklet covers, so you can make individual or a whole group class book.

Click on the link to view/download the Community Helpers card packet.

I also used them for a Roll, Count and Color Community Helpers dice game. 

You can run off a few of each kind of community helper, and give students a choice of which one they want to color for the dice game, or you can choose whatever community helper you are working on, and give each child the same one.

Before you begin, have students point to each number. As a whole group, count to 12. Explain to students that whatever number they roll, is the section that they color.

Demonstrate how you roll one die first, and then color numbers 1-6. If they’ve already rolled that number, they lose their turn.

When students have completed those sections, they roll 2 dice, and then add them together to get numbers 7-12 to color.

The child who colors all of the numbered sections first, or has the most numbers colored when the timer rings, is the winner.

After you explain the game, have students choose a partner to play with.

Remind them that they should write their name on their paper, as well as trace and write the name of their community helper.

Click on the link to view/download the Roll and Color the Community Helpers Dice Game.

Thanks for visiting today.  Feel free to PIN anything you think others may find helpful, and be sure to pop by tomorrow for more community helper activities!

"Books are not men, and yet they are alive.  They are man's memory and his aspiration; the link between his present and his past; the tools he builds with." -Stephen V. Benet