If the class is focusing on construction workers during a community-helpers theme unit, provide table activities that tie in with construction. Let children work together to build towers and buildings from blocks. Buy bolts of various sizes at a hardware store. Place them together in a box. Let prekindergarteners sort and compare the difference in sizes.
Choose an online activity to teach your class about community helpers at the computer table. On the educational website, Ben's Guide, prekindergarteners can click on a library, police station and other places community helpers work. Each click on a building reveals a picture of the historical figure, Ben Franklin, dressed as a community helper and contains text describing the job.
Fill baskets and boxes with dress-up items prekindergarteners can use to pretend to be community helpers. Label each box of dress-up items with the name of the helper that matches the things inside. Place adult-size white, button-up shirts in a box. The shirts fit prekindergarten-size children to serve as lab coats for role play featuring the medical profession. Add plastic stethoscopes and toy doctor or nurses bags in a box labeled "Hospital Workers." Plastic firefighter's helmets, red jackets and black boots are appropriate for a "Firefighter" box. Fill and label more boxes with items for other community helpers. Children dress as community helpers and engage in dramatic play with other children, pretending to do the job for which they are dressed.
Show prekindergarteners pictures of community helpers to inspire artwork. Borrow books from the library or use educational posters that have images of people dressed in the clothing worn on service jobs. Pass paper and markers or crayons to the children, and ask them to draw a picture of themselves dressed as a community helper. Place all the pictures on a bulletin board. Include the words "Community Helpers" on the board.
Give children old magazines to cut pictures of community helpers. Encourage the children to include pictures of people who need the services that community helpers provide. Glue the pictures to construction paper to create a collage of community helpers and those that benefit from the work.
Involve the class in a Pre-K language activity about community helpers that encourages prekindergarteners' confidence in verbal communication skills. Select a child to stand and describe the clothing and on-the-job activities of a community helper, without revealing the helper's job title. Class members guess the community helper being described. Let each child in class take a turn describing a community helper to his classmates.