Skills for Life: Healthy Lifestyle
Healthy lifestyle is a Pearson Skills for Life unit in which learners look at the factors that affect mental and physical health and wellbeing, review how far they follow a healthy lifestyle, plan steps or goals to improve it and take part in activities to meet those goals. It is one 20 hour unit that learners combine with others into a Pearson Skills for Life Award, Certificate or Diploma, from Entry 1 to Level 2. Literacy carries most of the assessment: listing, describing or explaining health factors, writing a personal plan and reflecting on activities. Numeracy is light: goals need timelines and, at Level 2, must be measurable, while comparing questionnaire scores with NHS targets is only suggested.
- Awarding body
- Pearson
- Level
- Entry Level 1 to Level 2
- Guided learning hours
- 20
- First taught
- September 2027
- Amount of literacy work
- Medium
- Amount of numeracy work
- Low
- Specification
- Open the specification
How this unit is assessed
- Entry Level (Entry 1, Entry 2, Entry 3): One assessment criterion at each of Entry 1, Entry 2 and Entry 3: list, outline or identify factors that affect health and wellbeing, give steps, simple goals or a basic plan to improve own lifestyle, and take part in activities to achieve them. The essential information for assessment decisions says how many factors, steps and goals learners show at each level. Centres choose the type of evidence and set and mark the assessment, adapting Pearson's Authorised Assignment Brief or devising their own, internally verified and quality assured by Pearson standards verification. 20 guided learning hours.
- Level 1 and Level 2: One assessment criterion at each of Level 1 and Level 2: describe (Level 1) or explain (Level 2) factors affecting health and wellbeing, review own lifestyle using different techniques, produce a clear, realistic plan (Level 1) or a detailed, measurable plan following SMART principles (Level 2), and take part in activities to achieve at least two (Level 1) or three (Level 2) planned goals, then reflect on them. Centres choose the type of evidence and set and mark the assessment, internally verified and quality assured by Pearson standards verification. 20 guided learning hours.
Skills that use Purpose
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Reflecting on activities and how they helped
After taking part in activities, Entry 1 learners say or indicate how an activity made them feel better, Entry 2 and Entry 3 learners give or state one way it helped, Level 1 learners briefly describe and Level 2 learners briefly explain how the activities helped them achieve their goals. This is required by the essential information for assessment decisions.
Literacy: Planning and organising for different purposes, audiences and context, Purpose
Getting pupils ready
- Year 7
- Pupils finish a sentence starter after a PE lesson, After the activity I felt, and add one reason.
- Year 8
- Pupils keep a five day wellbeing diary after a lunchtime walking challenge, writing two sentences a day on how they felt and why.
- Year 9
- Pupils write a short reflective account of a month long goal, explaining what worked, what did not and what they will change next.
Show the specification wording and the LNF statements
Where it is in the specification: Unit SfL 14, Essential information for assessment decisions, Entry 1 to Entry 3, page 69, Level 1 and Level 2, page 70
“Learners will reflect on the activities undertaken and briefly explain how they have helped to achieve their goals”
Progression step 3
I can write about my thoughts, feelings and opinions, showing empathy and respect.
I can share, talk and write about my thoughts, feelings and opinions using a range of techniques to show impact.
Progression step 4
I can share, talk and write about my thoughts, feelings and opinions showing empathy and respect.
I can write about my thoughts, feelings and opinions, using a range of techniques, e.g. emotive language, hyperbole, choice of pronouns (you, we), to show impact.
Good to know
- The unit is listed as "SfL 14 Healthy lifestyle" with a Unit GLH of 20 (Unit summary, page 5). It counts towards the Pearson Skills for Life qualifications, for example C00/5444/4 "Pearson Level 1 Skills for Life Award" (Qualification titles, page 4).
- A unit counts only once: "Learners can only achieve each unit once, at a single level" (Rules of Combination, page 6, and Assessment of units, page 9), so schools should decide which level each learner is working towards.
- Evidence does not have to be written: "there are no mandatory evidence requirements and centres can select the type of evidence" (Essential information for assessment decisions, page 69), and Entry 1 learners may simply "say or indicate how the activity made them feel better" (Entry 1, page 69).
- The Level 2 plan has a set format: learners produce a plan "following SMART principles" (Essential information for assessment decisions, Level 2, page 70), so goals must be specific and measurable with timelines.
- Learners "can be assessed in Welsh or English" (Language of assessment, page 8), and the required teaching content is in the separate Teaching and Learning Support document (Unit content, page 69).
- AI must be acknowledged: "If AI is used, the final submission must be in the learner's own words and reflect their own effort" (Requirements relating to permitted/prohibited resources, page 71).
- In Annexe C the Numeracy and Literacy columns for SfL 14 appear to be swapped: the Numeracy column lists "completing questionnaires/diaries and reflective accounts" and the Literacy column lists "interpreting questionnaire scores" against NHS targets, which is numeracy (Annexe C, page 162). Annexe B ticks numeracy, literacy and digital links for the unit (page 158).
Links with other qualifications
Explaining health factors, writing SMART goals and reflecting on activities are shared with WJEC GCSE Physical Education and Health and the WJEC VCSE and Foundation in Sport and Leisure, and reading food guidance links with WJEC GCSE Food and Nutrition. Comparing scores and timelines with guideline targets touches WJEC GCSE Mathematics and Numeracy only lightly. Within the WJEC Skills Suite, Exercise for All and Food Planning and Preparation ask for similar plans and reflections. Compared with the WJEC Healthy lifestyle unit, also 20 hours, which spreads the writing across four learning outcomes and has Level 1 and Level 2 learners track a goal, the Pearson unit puts the literacy into one combined criterion per level and its numeracy into a plan with at least three goals and timelines at Level 1 and a measurable SMART plan at Level 2.
Source: Pearson Entry Level 1 to Level 2 Skills for Life Award, Certificate and Diploma Qualifications specification, Issue 1, August 2026, Unit SfL 14: Healthy lifestyle.