When I taught PreK, our Community Helpers unit was one of my favorite units of the school year! My students loved learning all about the different professions, and picking out what they wanted to be when they grew up!
Let’s take a look at some resources you can use that go beyond plastic fire hats.
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First, we need some songs to sing:
Firefighters Song for Kids is catchy tune that tells what firefighters do and what equipment they use. It features two male and one female firefighter.
Police Car for Children has a memorable refrain but the verses are more informative than singable.
Many kids’ favorite helper is the garbage man, and The Garbage Truck Song shows the truck at work and the tune isn’t too annoying.
Teachers deserve a song too, and we have one: The Teacher Song for Kids
Be a Doctor is catchy: “I want to be a doctor, I want to go to school, I want to learn to take care of me and you”.
ELA Resources
Looking for a way to integrate social studies with your ELA block? Check out these fantastic resources:
Community Helpers Sort & Classify Mats by FairyPoppins.
The Measured Mom has a series of three downloadable community helpers reading/coloring books.
Memory is a favorite game with the younger set and Lifeovercs has one based on community helpers.
My Community Helpers Reading Comprehension Passages gives you 20 short passages about community helpers, each of which is followed by three reading comprehension questions.
Community Helpers Books
You can’t do a unit study without some good books!
Mercer Mayer’s Little Critter is always a favorite. Add these to your lesson plans:
The Berenstain Bears are another favorite. These books are sure to be a big hit:
- The Berenstain Bears Visit the Dentist
- The Berenstain Bears Go to the Doctor
- The Berenstain Bears Visit the Firehouse
Coloring Pages
Coloring pages are a great (and easy!) resource to help your students practice their fine motor skills, color recognition, self-expression, and focus!
Here are a few places where you can find free coloring pages for community helpers!
DLTK offers a wide variety of coloring sheets including mail carriers, police officers and nurses (though today’s children have probably never seen a nurse’s cap in real life)
Supercoloring’s pictures are more realistic, but may be harder for little hands to color.
Mom Junction is another great source for community helpers coloring pages.
Community Helpers Complete Unit
Looking for a complete unit on community helpers? Cut your lesson-planning time in half with my Community Helpers Social Studies Complete Unit for little learners!
This unit is filled with no-prep printables and activities you can do during your community helpers unit! Check out what’s included:
- Posters of all of the helpers and for each individual helper. Each poster comes in color and black and white.
- Can/have/are worksheets
- Label the helper activities
- Bubble map graphic organizer to describe each helper
- Writing sheets for each helper
- Letter worksheets for younger learners
- Word wall cards with and without pictures, and in color and black and white
- 2 mini-book options to choose from
- 8 writing prompts
- Write the room cards (in color and black and white) and an answer sheet
Click here to check out the full Community Helpers Social Studies unit!
If you have the time and the means, you can also invite members of the community to come to your classroom and discuss their jobs! My students LOVED when our resource officer came in and showed them all of the tools on his tool belt!
Enjoy your unit, and inspire the next generation of teachers, dentists, and artists!
