School Community Helpers Sorting Mats Real Photos | Back to School | SPED Autism
Product Description
School Community Helpers Sorting Mats with Real Photos | 10 Mats Featuring People at School
This sorting set teaches students to identify school community helpers and the objects associated with them through engaging real photo visuals. The set includes 10 sorting mats — one for each school helper — where students match objects/tools to the correct school helper.
★ REAL PHOTOS throughout — real images for autism classrooms, ELL students, and concrete learners
★ Perfect for: Special Education Teachers, Autism Classrooms, Speech-Language Pathologists (SLPs), Elementary Teachers (Social Studies/Community Helpers Units), Self-Contained Classrooms, Resource Rooms, Life Skills Classes, ELL/ESL Teachers, Paraprofessionals, ABA Therapists, Early Childhood, PreK, Preschool, Kindergarten, 1st Grade, and 2nd Grade
10 School Community Helpers Included:
👩🏫 Teacher
🎨 Art Teacher
🎵 Music Teacher
⚽ P.E. Teacher
👩⚕️ Nurse
👔 Principal
📚 Librarian
🍽️ Cafeteria Worker
🧹 Custodian
🚌 Bus Driver
Example of What's on Each Mat:
The Music Teacher mat includes objects like a tambourine, bass drum, snare drum, guitar, and bells — students match these items to the Music Teacher.
Each mat features distinctive objects/tools associated with that school helper, building both vocabulary AND understanding of who does what at school.
Skills Targeted:
- School community helpers identification
- Sorting and categorization
- Tools and objects associated with each role
- Receptive and expressive language
- Visual discrimination
- Categorization
- Back-to-school orientation
- Critical thinking (matching objects to roles)
- Following directions
- Independent work skills
How to Use These Sorting Mats:
In an independent workstation, center, or language group, students complete the sorting mats by identifying the person at school and the things associated with him or her. Students sort tool/object pieces onto the correct school helper mat.
Built-in differentiation: To decrease difficulty, give students fewer mats (2-3 at a time). To increase difficulty, give them all 10 mats to sort simultaneously.
Ways to Use:
- Community helpers thematic units
- Back-to-school orientation activities
- "People at school" units
- Small group instruction
- 1:1 instruction
- Speech therapy (vocabulary, categorization IEP goals!)
- ELL/ESL school vocabulary instruction
- Independent workstations
- Centers and learning stations
- Meet the staff activities (great for new students!)
- School building orientation
To increase or decrease difficulty for students, increase or decrease the number of mats (or people at school) that you give them to sort at once.
If your students benefit from activities using real photos, there are many more in my collection. You can find them at the links below:
Sorting Our World File Folder Games
For more hands-on back to school, fall or apple themed activities, please see the following links:
