Collection: Community Trips | Field Trip Activities for Special Education

What Are Community Trip Activities?

Community trip activities help students prepare for real-world outings by teaching expectations, vocabulary, routines, and social skills connected to common community experiences.

These lessons support students as they learn what to expect when visiting places like grocery stores, restaurants, libraries, movie theaters, bowling alleys, zoos, and more.

Why Community Trip Preparation Matters

Many students benefit from practicing community experiences before visiting a new location.

Preparing in advance helps students:

• Understand what to expect during outings
• Build confidence before new experiences
• Practice important social and safety skills
• Reduce anxiety surrounding unfamiliar environments
  

This helps make community outings more successful and meaningful for both students and teachers.

Cross-Curricular Learning Opportunities

Each community trip unit includes activities that connect to both math and language arts concepts while also reinforcing social skills and community education.

This allows you to integrate life skills instruction into multiple subject areas while keeping lessons practical and engaging.

What’s Included in Each Unit

Each community trip resource includes a variety of materials to support student learning, such as:

• Vocabulary cards
• Bingo boards with 2 levels included
• Social skills games
• Various worksheets
• One-page field trip social stories
• Full-size community social story books
• Social story coloring books
  

The variety of formats helps reinforce concepts in multiple ways while keeping students engaged.

How to Use in the Classroom

These community trip activities are great for:

• Pre-teaching before field trips
• Community-based instruction lessons
• Life skills instruction
• Small group work
• Independent practice
• Social skills lessons
  

They can be used before an actual outing or as part of ongoing functional life skills instruction.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are community trip activities?

Community trip activities are structured lessons that help students prepare for field trips and real-world outings by teaching expectations, vocabulary, and social skills.

Who are these resources designed for?

These activities are designed for special education students, autism support classrooms, and learners working on life skills and community-based instruction.

Why should students prepare before field trips?

Pre-teaching helps students understand expectations, reduce anxiety, and build confidence before visiting a new location.

What skills do these resources support?

Students practice vocabulary, social skills, community awareness, life skills, and communication while building familiarity with real-world experiences.

How are these used in the classroom?

Teachers use them before field trips, during life skills instruction, in small groups, and as part of community-based learning units.

Are these only for students attending field trips?

No. These resources can also be used to teach life skills and community awareness even if students are not actively going on outings.

Looking for the Full Bundle?

Save time planning and grab the Community Trips Bundle for a complete set of community outing resources.

The bundle includes multiple field trip units so you can prepare students for a variety of common outings while keeping routines consistent all year long.

These resources are perfect for classrooms incorporating community-based instruction and real-world life skills practice.