Skills for Life: Personal Safety
Personal safety is Pearson Skills for Life Unit SfL 21, in which learners recognise hazards and dangers that could affect their safety and plan actions to stay safe. It is one 20 hour unit that learners combine with others into a Pearson Skills for Life or Skills for Work Award, Certificate or Diploma, achieved once at a single level from Entry 1 to Level 2. Literacy sits in the criteria: stating, outlining and identifying risks and actions at Entry level, then writing a structured risk assessment and safety plan at Level 1 and Level 2 and explaining how it keeps learners safe. Numeracy demand is low: Pearson maps risk rating and prioritising actions, but no criterion asks for calculation.
- 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: learners state, outline or identify reasons why their personal safety might be at risk and actions they can take to stay safe or reduce the risks. There are no mandatory evidence requirements; the centre sets its own assignment (Pearson's Authorised Assignment Brief is optional), assesses it internally, and Pearson quality assures it through standards verification. Graded Pass or Fail. 20 guided learning hours.
- Level 1 and Level 2: One assessment criterion at each level: at Level 1 learners create a simple personal safety risk assessment and basic plan for some different settings, and at Level 2 a detailed risk assessment and plan for home, the community and online, explaining how it keeps them safe. Evidence type is chosen by the centre, internally assessed by the centre and quality assured by Pearson through standards verification. Graded Pass or Fail. 20 guided learning hours.
Skills that use Calculation
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Rating and prioritising risks
Pearson's annex mapping names risk rating and prioritising actions as the unit's numeracy, for example scoring how likely and how serious a hazard is to decide which actions come first in a risk assessment. The assessment criteria do not require any rating or calculation, so this is taught content and numeracy demand is low.
Numeracy: Calculation, Strategic competence, Representing data
Getting pupils ready
- Year 7
- Pupils score five classroom hazards from 1 to 3 for how likely they are and order them from highest to lowest.
- Year 8
- Pupils use a five by five risk matrix, multiply likelihood by severity for six hazards, and decide which two to deal with first.
- Year 9
- Pupils rate the hazards in their own risk assessment, present the scores in a colour coded table, and justify the order of their actions.
Show the specification wording and the LNF statements
Where it is in the specification: Annexe C, Evidence for Units mapped against Curriculum for Wales Cross-curricular skills frameworks, SfL 21 Numeracy Links, page 164
“Risk rating/prioritising actions (risk assessment)”
Progression step 3
I can use mental strategies to recall multiplication tables up to 10 x 10 and use to solve division problems.
I can prioritise and organise the relevant steps needed to complete the task or reach a solution.
Progression step 4
I can prioritise and organise the relevant steps needed to complete the task or reach a solution.
I can select and construct appropriate charts, diagrams and graphs with suitable scales.
Good to know
- The unit is "SfL 21" with "20" guided learning hours in the unit summary table (Section 3, page 5), and "Learners can only achieve each unit once, at a single level" (Rules of Combination, page 6).
- Each level sets a minimum number of examples, from "at least three familiar hazards" at Entry 1 to "three detailed risk assessments" at Level 2 (Essential information for assessment decisions, page 100).
- Centres choose the evidence: "there are no mandatory evidence requirements and centres can select the type of evidence" (Essential information for assessment decisions, page 100), so Entry learners can show their understanding orally or visually.
- Assessments "can include both practical and written tasks" and are "independently completed as a distinct activity after the required teaching has taken place" (Assessment of units, page 9).
- Learners can be assessed "in Welsh or English" (Language of assessment, page 8).
- AI must be acknowledged and work must be in learners' own words: "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 101).
Links with other qualifications
WJEC also offers a Personal safety Skills for Life unit, also 20 guided learning hours. The WJEC unit spreads its literacy across four learning outcomes, from explaining what personal safety means to analysing and evaluating safety actions at Level 2. The Pearson unit has one criterion per level and concentrates the writing in a personal safety risk assessment and plan at Level 1 and Level 2. GCSE Health and Social Care and Childcare shares writing about hazards and how to keep people safe, and GCSE English Language and Literature and GCSE Cymraeg Language and Literature share explaining and organising information for a reader. Within the Skills Suite, Basic first aid and Online safety share describing hazards and the actions that reduce them.
Source: Pearson Entry Level 1 to Level 2 Skills for Life Award, Certificate and Diploma specification, Issue 1, August 2026, Unit SfL 21: Personal safety.