Skills for Life & Employability

In this section...

• skills for life in social care
• why we have to take action on skills for life
• managing skills for life
• employability

'Skills for life' is the government strategy for improving adult literacy and numeracy in England. It covers:

• Numeracy (understanding, calculating and using mathematical information.)
• Literacy (reading, writing, listening and speaking in English.)
• ESOL (English for speakers of other languages.)
• Basic ICT skills (information and communications technology.)

Skills for life is also used as a general term to describe anything linked to language, literacy and numeracy, such as key skills, computer skills and the new functional skills.

Every different job role in adult social care involves using and understanding information, and communicating effectively. This means that everyone working in the sector needs to have good language and number skills to do their job well and to guarantee high quality care services.

Skills for life are the building blocks or foundations that support the development of all other skills and knowledge.

Skills for Care is promoting skills for life development across all parts of the adult social care sector in England.

• Skills for life - a practical guide for employers summarises everything you need to know to get started.
• Learning Through Work guides 

Skills for Care has published Learning through Work, a series of learning modules that develop communication and number skills in the adult social care workplace. They are designed to help supervisors deliver bite-size chunks of learning wherever natural learning opportunities arise as part of day to day care work. The guides are available to purchase via the Social Care Association. For more information click on the link below: Learning Through Work guides