Skills for Work: Building a Growth Mindset
Building a growth mindset covers overcoming setbacks and building resilience, managing stress in the moment, the difference between a fixed and a growth mindset, and building helpful long term habits. It is one 20 hour Skills for Work unit that learners combine with other units into a Skills for Work, or Skills for Life and Work, Award, Certificate or Diploma. Literacy is the main cross-curricular skill: learners talk and write about their own setbacks and feelings, explain words such as resilience and habit, compare fixed and growth mindsets and reflect on strategies. Numeracy is only incidental, through tracking a habit over a week.
- Awarding body
- WJEC
- 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
How this unit is assessed
- Entry Level (Entry 1, Entry 2, Entry 3): Four learning outcomes with assessment criteria at Entry 1, Entry 2 and Entry 3. Evidence is compiled into a portfolio, internally assessed by the centre and externally quality assured by WJEC. 20 guided learning hours, Skills for Work group.
- Level 1 and Level 2: Four learning outcomes with assessment criteria at Level 1 and Level 2. Evidence is compiled into a portfolio, internally assessed by the centre and externally quality assured by WJEC. 20 guided learning hours, Skills for Work group.
Skills that use Understanding, response and analysis
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Comparing fixed and growth mindsets
Learners recognise the difference between a growth and a fixed mindset from examples at Entry 2, compare what each person might do at Entry 3, describe the difference at Level 1, and compare them and say why they are different at Level 2. This is required by the assessment criteria; sorting phrases and reading short real life stories are suggested ways in.
Literacy: Understanding, response and analysis, Connectives and syntax, Planning and organising for different purposes, audiences and context
Getting pupils ready
- Year 7
- Pupils sort printed phrases such as I give up and I will try another way into fixed and growth mindset columns and explain one choice to the class.
- Year 8
- Pupils read two short stories about learners facing a hard maths test and write which character shows a growth mindset and which words show it.
- Year 9
- Pupils write a short comparison of a fixed and a growth mindset using whereas and however, with an example of how each would react to the same setback.
Show the specification wording and the LNF statements
Where it is in the specification: Entry Level, learning outcome 3, assessment criteria 3.1 and 3.2, page 6; Level 1 and Level 2, learning outcome 3, assessment criteria 3.1 and 3.2, page 7; suggested activities, page 13
“Compare a growth mindset and fixed mindset”
Progression step 3
I can read to identify different people’s viewpoints on various subjects and develop empathy.
I can use an increasing range of connectives to organise my ideas in sentences, paragraphs and whole texts.
Progression step 4
I can read to identify different people’s viewpoints on various subjects, using them to arrive at my own conclusions.
I can use summary, discussion of issues, detailed explanations and logic when covering a topic.
Good to know
- Unit codes are S652E1, S652E2, S652E3, S652L1 and S652L2, and the unit is "GLH 20" in the Skills for Work suite (Unit overview, page 3).
- Appendix A of the specification ticks only Literacy among the cross-curricular and integral skills for this unit (page 29), so there is no Numeracy mapping.
- Evidence does not have to be long writing: "evidence may be verbal, written, practical or visual, extended written work is not required unless appropriate" (Sources of evidence, page 14), and teacher observation notes of discussions and role plays count.
- Spelling and layout are not judged unless a criterion asks: "Assessor judgements should focus on meeting the standard, not spelling or presentation unless specifically assessed." (Sources of evidence, page 14).
- The pack expects subject vocabulary: at Entry Level learners "will begin to use a range of discipline-specific vocabulary to express their answer" and at Level 1 and 2 they "will explain and give reasons for their answers" (Unit overview, page 4).
- Suggested assessment tasks are optional: "These tasks are not mandatory." Teachers may adapt them or write their own (Skills for Life and Work specification, section 4.1, page 18).
- AI tools must be acknowledged. Misuse includes "Copying or paraphrasing whole responses of AI-generated content" (Skills for Life and Work specification, section 4.6, page 21). Most criteria ask for personal description and reflection, which should be the learner's own.
Links with other qualifications
The pack names Fairness and inclusion in the workplace, Wellbeing and work, Personal development planning, Interview and confidence techniques and Overcoming barriers as Skills Suite units to deliver alongside it, and the Skills for Life unit Mental health and wellbeing covers stress and coping in more depth. Talking and writing about personal experience, feelings and opinions builds on the speaking, listening and reflective writing in GCSE English Language and Literature and, in Welsh, GCSE Core Cymraeg and GCSE Cymraeg Language and Literature. The work on stress and healthy habits links with the Health and well-being Area of Learning and Experience and so with GCSE Physical Education and Health.
Source: WJEC Building a growth mindset unit delivery and assessment pack, read with the WJEC Entry 1 to Level 2 Skills for Life and Skills for Work specification, approved by Qualifications Wales, teaching from September 2027 (© WJEC CBAC Ltd 2026).