One of the life skills we need to work on with students is community signs. It’s important that students not only know how to read the signs, but they also need to know what they mean. Here are some of the ways that we target the skills.
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We begin by looking for and noticing the signs around us. We take a walk around our school neighborhood to find signs. We also make a list of the signs we see on the bus. Then we read this book, I Read Signs, Tana Hoban. If you don’t have this book, I highly recommend it. It’s great for community signs and language development.
This book, I Read Signs, is a wordless book, but the pictures are fantastic for discussions about the community. On the pages below, we talked about what the signs means, where you see the sign, etc.
Students were able to make connections between the text, signs and their experiences.
Practice safety skills by talking about what these signs mean, where you see them, why it is important to follow them and dangerous not to. SOOOO many ways to practice language, comprehension, life skills and safety!!!
Next, we start working on generalized practice with different pictures and different types of practice. We use the file folders and clip cards from the Community Signs Skill Pack. Different levels are included in the pack, so all of my students can practice at their level.
Students who are still working on identifying the signs work on this file folder (below). To complete this file folder, student match picture to picture.
Students match meaning of signs to the picture in the other file folder. Great way to add in reading comprehension skills!
Since we are still trying to relate this info to their life outside of school, I usually ask students questions after they have completed these tasks. For example:
Which of these signs do you see on your way to school?
Have you ever seen this sign? Where?
Can I use this bathroom? How come?
I also use these leveled community signs clip cards in work task boxes.
Additionally, we also teach about community signs during our direct instruction work centers. Read more about our work centers HERE.
No matter how you teach community signs, they are a vital component of life skills training!
More blog posts about life skills training:
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