Activity Description

Preparation:

1. Find dress up clothes that represent several community helpers
   1. For example, firefighter hat and boots, gardening gloves and tools
2. Create a name card for each community helper
   1. Write the names in clear, lowercase letters
3. Right before the activity begins, invite several students to dress up as the community helpers
   1. Do this while the rest of the students are engaged in other activities

Implementation:

1. Introduce each community helper to the class (without using their title) and have everyone guess who they are and what they do
   1. Ask students to support their ideas based on clues from the community helpers appearance
   2. Ask students to elaborate on their answers by asking questions
      • For example: Right! This person does have a job related to flowers. Can you tell me more about what you think this person does?
   3. If students are having difficulty, think-aloud about how you are able to guess the community helpers identity
2. For each community helper:
   1. Show the class the cards with the names of your community helpers
   2. Ask them to think about the first sound they hear in the community helpers name
   3. Invite a student to come up and choose the correct card based on their knowledge of letter-sound correspondences
      • Praise the student if they are correct or provide support if they have difficulty choosing the correct card
      • Have the student give the card to the community helper to hold
3. Repeat this process until all the community helpers have been identified
4. Then, review each name as a class

Adaptations For

English Language Learners/ESL:

- Give students more exposure to information about each community helper if they are not familiar with them
- Encourage these students to actively participate by allowing them to dress up as one of the community members
- Define and practice new vocabulary words (such as "firefighter" or "hose")

LD/Reading & Writing Difficulties:

- Some students may need additional help observing clues and making guesses
- If students struggle with letter-sound correspondences, provide assistance if you invite them to choose the correct name card

Cultural Appropriateness & Diversity:

- Ensure that students are not assigned "stereotyped" roles (for example: male firefighter, police officer, and doctor, female nurse, teacher, and mother)
- Use gender-neutral job titles, such as "police officer" instead of "police man"

Differentiated Instruction:

- Allow some or all students to guess the name of the community helper by writing the names with inventive spelling and holding up their guess

Related References

Evidence:
Kalmar, K. (2008). Let's give children something to talk about! Oral language and pre-school literacy. Young Children, 63, 88-92.