Soft skills are integral to any workplace, professional environment or business setting. Whilst these skills are learned indirectly through daily interactions throughout a child’s broad general education, there is an increasing focus on the significance and development of emotional intelligence, communication abilities, language skills, personal habits, cognitive or emotional empathy, and leadership traits. These soft skills are crucial in supporting a child’s development towards their readiness to work.
The school environment is one of the few opportunities in a person’s lifetime where they will be surrounded by others within the same age group, sharing many similar experiences and communicating within the same circles. The soft skills acquired in these formative years will be called upon increasingly as a child moves towards higher education or employment, but the stakes and expectations rise too. Findings show that “schools provide the safest environment to test some of these skills” (Ee and Change, 2015) and it is consequently not an opportunity which schools can afford to pass by, when considering how to best provide for their pupils.
Here is one example per level of the areas of the "I can" framework that would typically be covered by engaging your young people in a soft skills event. Download the mapping document for more!