Skills for Life: Home Management and Maintenance
Home management and maintenance is a Pearson Skills for Life unit in which learners plan cleaning, safety and security routines for each room of a home on a floor plan, wire a plug and choose the right fuse, choose and fit a light bulb, sort waste for recycling and sort laundry using care labels, linking choices to energy and water use. 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. Digital demand is low because the tasks are practical. Digital work is limited to an optional digital floor plan, online research and acknowledging sources and AI.
- Awarding body
- Pearson
- Level
- Entry Level 1 to Level 2
- Guided learning hours
- 20
- First taught
- September 2027
- Amount of digital 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 household routines and demonstrate basic, simple or most steps in practical tasks. The essential information for assessment decisions names the tasks: noting cleaning, safety and security routines for each room on a floor plan or equivalent, fitting a fuse or wiring a plug, fitting a bulb, sorting waste and recycling, and sorting laundry using labels. 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) the main skills and activities in household routines, safety and sustainability, and complete practical tasks, competently at Level 2: an annotated floor plan, wiring an old style plug and choosing the correct fuse for a heating appliance, choosing and fitting a bulb, sorting all waste items, and choosing wash cycles from laundry labels with links to energy and water use. 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 Evaluating and improving digital content
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Producing an annotated floor plan of household routines
At every level learners record cleaning routines, safety measures and security points for each room on a floor plan or equivalent, from listing one or two routines at Entry 1 to detailed annotations explaining why each matters at Level 2. The plan is required, but it can be drawn by hand, so making it with drawing or presentation software is optional and not assessed.
DCF: Creating digital content, Evaluating and improving digital content
Getting pupils ready
- Year 7
- Pupils draw a simple plan of a kitchen using rectangles in a drawing tool and add text boxes with one cleaning job and one safety point.
- Year 8
- Pupils build a floor plan of a flat in presentation software, using shapes for rooms and colour coded callouts for cleaning, safety and security.
- Year 9
- Pupils produce a labelled digital floor plan of a whole house with an annotation for each room explaining its routines, then explain their layout choices to a partner.
Show the specification wording and the DCF statements
Where it is in the specification: Unit SfL 16, Essential information for assessment decisions, Entry 1 to Entry 3, pages 78 to 79, Level 1 and Level 2, page 79
“with detailed annotations on a floor plan or equivalent”
Progression step 3
I can use a range of software to select, produce and edit a range of multimedia components for a purpose, such as:
- text and images, e.g. format text (bold, underline, italics, highlight); insert and edit text boxes; columns; use refine tools (spellchecker, find and replace); word wrap; crop; alter size and shape; alter images; add effects; trim and split sound and video clips; transitions; onion skin
- presentation, e.g. page orientation; animations; transitions; remove and alter images; use background; use action buttons to create hyperlink; embed objects.
I can explain reasons for layout and content of my own work and the work of others.
Progression step 4
I can select and use a variety of appropriate software, tools and techniques to create, modify and combine multimedia components for a range of audiences and purposes, such as:
- text and images, e.g. explore and use effectively image manipulation techniques; explore and use appropriately the many aspects of document layout; use animation, video and audio effects such as echo, tempo, envelope, layering, frame rate, key frames
- presentation, e.g. use design tools; adapt themes and colours to suit the purpose; create master templates.
Good to know
- The unit is listed as "SfL 16 Home management and maintenance" 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.
- The required teaching content is in a separate document: it is in the "Teaching and Learning Support document t for this unit" (Unit content, page 78), which also shows a stray letter t in the printed text.
- The practical tasks need equipment. From Entry 3 learners wire an old style plug, and Level 1 learners "wire an old-style plug correctly, knowing the names of each of the wires" (Level 1, page 79), as well as fitting fuses and bulbs and sorting real waste and laundry items. The centre "can decide the resource requirements" (Requirements relating to permitted/prohibited resources, page 80).
- Safety supervision is expected at lower levels: Entry 1 learners "recognise when an adult needs to take over, especially in relation to safety issues" (Levels of supervision and support, page 80).
- Evidence is flexible: "there are no mandatory evidence requirements and centres can select the type of evidence" (Essential information for assessment decisions, page 78), but "achievement cannot be inferred from performance" (Section 4, page 9), so practical tasks need observation records or photographs.
- AI must be acknowledged: "A learner will have committed malpractice if they use AI tools without acknowledging them" (Requirements relating to permitted/prohibited resources, page 80).
- Annexe C records "No direct link" for digital, as the unit "mentions online sources but no explicit digital tasks required" (Annexe C, page 163), and Annexe B ticks no digital link (page 158).
- The unit says its cross-cutting theme experiences "can be found in Annexe E" (page 81), but Annexe E has no row for SfL 16: the table goes straight from SfL 5 to SfL 18 (page 172), and Annexe D ticks no themes for this unit (page 168).
Links with other qualifications
Pearson maps the unit to the Science and Technology and Humanities 'What matters' statements, and its practical, safety and sustainability work links with WJEC GCSE Design and Technology and the WJEC VCSE in Built Environment, which the WJEC unit also names, while sorting waste and choosing low energy wash cycles links with the WJEC Skills Suite unit Sustainability in Action. Financial Literacy pairs naturally with the budgeting in the unit content, and Food Planning and Preparation shares cleaning and hygiene routines. Compared with the WJEC Home management and maintenance unit, also 20 hours, which has four learning outcomes covering routines, simple maintenance with hand tools such as assembling flat pack items, hygiene and sustainable habits, the Pearson unit has one criterion per level built around set practical tasks, including electrical tasks such as wiring a plug, fitting a fuse and choosing a bulb that the WJEC unit does not include.
Source: Pearson Entry Level 1 to Level 2 Skills for Life Award, Certificate and Diploma Qualifications specification, Issue 1, August 2026, Unit SfL 16: Home management and maintenance.