Part NCFE Level 1 Social Development 1 A
PART A Welcome to the first part of NCFE s Level 1 Certificate in Personal and Social Development. We hope you find all of the information contained in this resource pack interesting and informative. These learning resources and assessments have been approved by NCFE as a great way to meet the learning outcomes for this qualification. (A complete list of the learning outcomes can be found on the last page of this resource.) The course is divided into four parts (A B, C and D). This is Part A which contains two units: Unit 1: Developing Self Page 2 Unit 2: Dealing With Problems In Daily Life Page 24 As you start to read through each page you will be able to make notes and comments on things you have learnt or may want to revisit at a later stage. Each unit has a number of small sections. At the end of each section you will be asked to go to your assessment booklet and answer the relevant questions. Once you have answered the questions go to the next section and continue studying until all of the assessments have been completed. Please make sure that you set aside enough time to read each section carefully, making notes and completing all of the activities. This will allow you to gain a better understanding of the subject content and will help you to answer all of the assessment questions accurately. Good luck with your study. Now let s begin! 1
Unit 1: Developing Self Welcome to the first unit, Developing Self. This unit is split into four sections. These are: Section 1: Identifying your strengths This section will help you to identify what your strengths and abilities are and also look at what you feel you are not so good at. Section 2: Self development This section will look at why you may want to develop certain areas of your life which you think you can improve on. Section 3: Self development plans and review This section will help you to make plans to improve certain areas of your life. It will also look at how to improve these plans and review them to make sure you are on track for improvement. Section 4: Barriers to self development This section will look at what might prevent you from improving. SECTION 1: Identifying your strengths We are all good at some things and not so good at others. Some things come very naturally to us and we may have been good at them since we were young. For example, you may have always been good at sport or singing. There are many skills that we have to learn, and we can become very good at certain things. We can improve on these skills by spending time practicing. Some skills we may take up later on in life and find that we have a natural talent for them. Sometimes the things we are good at are not necessarily academic subjects or sports. We may find we are naturally very good at being organised or that we are very confident talking to people. In this unit we will look closely at our strengths and how to improve in areas of our lives in which we would like to get better. 2
Identifying personal strengths What is a strength? A strength is a combination of talent, behaviour, skills and knowledge that you consistently apply to a task or process to produce a successful result. For example: If you organise your family in the mornings so they arrive at school or work on time then organising people is a strength of yours. We can use four criteria to identify our strengths. 1. Which activities make me feel involved and engaged? When I am busy with this activity do I think about other things and when it will be over or am I totally concentrated on the task at hand? Do I look forward to doing this activity again? 2. What are my immediate reactions to the situation and activity? Am I enjoying the activity or situation? Does it feel right? What activities give me a sense of satisfaction? 3. Which activities am I usually good at? What do I do best? What do I do to a high level? What provides a consistent pattern of successful results? What seems to be done well and effortlessly? 4. Which activities did I find easy to learn? What activities and tasks have I been able to learn quickly? In what areas and activities have I experienced quick insight and understanding? Identifying personal strengths It can sometimes be difficult to identify your own strengths. Most of us are not very good at recognising our own strengths and also not very good at asking for help to develop things we are not very good at. It may be useful to ask family or friends to help you when identifying your strengths. Very often other people can see the things we are good at better than we can. Think about a typical day in your life and all the skills you use throughout the day. For example: Do you have a lot to do before you go to work? Do you have a difficult manager or colleague that you have to work with? Do you have to juggle a lot of activities during the day in order to keep everybody happy? 3
There are lots of things we do that we take for granted. For example, you may have to look after people at home before you can concentrate on yourself, or you may be able to get people at work to understand what you are trying to do without confusing or upsetting anyone. These two examples involve organisation and negotiation skills. If you can relate to the above examples, then these may be your strengths. Strengths can be adapted into all sorts of areas of our lives. For example, if you are very good at organising your family you may well be very good at organising people at work. Don t think just because you are good at one thing in one area of your life that you have to learn a new skill for a different situation; skills such as these are transferrable. Alphabet of strengths We are now going to think about your strengths. A Adapting Activity 1: My Strengths Let s take a look at the following selection of activities. Put a tick in either the box or the box dependent on whether or not you are good or bad at the following activities/strengths: can you change how you do things to fit in with different locations / people / tasks? Analysing can you look at a set of data or information and understand and interpret what it means? B Budgeting - are you good with money? Building are you good at manual work? C Communicating A are you good at talking to all sorts of people? Can you make yourself understood easily? Caring are you good at looking after people? D Deciding can you make decisions easily? E Evaluating - can you sum up a situation easily? F Fixing can you find solutions to problems? 4
H Helping - can you see when people might need your help? Handling can you successfully handle new or difficult situations? I Implementing can you put in place new rules or regulations? N Negotiating are you good at convincing people to do things your way, or perhaps seeing some middle ground on which you can agree? O Organising are you good at organising people and projects? Do you work to time and meet deadlines? P Presenting - do you like to stand up in front of people and explain your ideas? Problem-solving do you enjoy having a challenge to find a solution to? Q Questioning Improving do you always try and improve your performance? Influencing - can you positively influence others around you? J Juggling can you do lots of things at once? K Knowledgeable are you very knowledgeable about particular subjects? L Learning do you pick things up very quickly? M Managing are you good at managing people or projects? Motivating do you inspire people to do well? are you good at finding the right questions to ask people in order to do things better? 5
S Selling - could you convince people to buy anything from you? T Team-work U Updating V Volunteering W Writing Speaking are you good at speaking to people and making yourself understood? - are you a great team player? Do you enjoy being part of a team rather than being on your own? are you always keen to have the most up to date gadgets and information? Do you like finding out what is new? do you enjoy going the extra mile and offering to help others out? are you good at putting your thoughts on paper (or onto a computer)? i Key fact Weaknesses are not always bad. They can be seen as opportunities to improve. STOP AND THINK! After doing the activity above you may think of other things you are very good at. Think of three of your key strengths and list them in the space below. 1. 2. 3. 6