What is Basic Life Skills?

Life skills are defined as “a group of psychosocial competencies and

interpersonal skills that help people make informed decisions, solve

problems, think critically and creatively, communicate effectively,

build healthy relationships, empathize with others, and cope with and

manage their lives in a healthy and productive manner. Life skills may

be directed toward personal actions or actions toward others, as well

as toward actions to change the surrounding environment to make it

conducive to health.” according to World Health Organization (WHO).

Bearing the WHO definition in mind, the Basic Life Skills curriculum

offers youth the emotional, social and intellectual tools needed to

achieve success in life – on a personal level, an interpersonal level,

and within their community and work places.

Who Developed Basic Life Skills Curriculum?

It was developed by UNICEF in close collaboration with the Ministry

of Youth and Sport of Azerbaijan to provide youth with new

knowledge and the opportunity to apply novel skills in a safe environment for the successful
transitioning to the adulthood.

“The training course has taught

me the importance of finding a

job I will really enjoy doing and

to enjoy every moment of my

life.”

Why Is Basic Life Skills Important?

The Basic Life skills provides readily available tools to deal with challenges/demands of daily lives the
youth face, from managing their emotions to make an informed decision. It also helps develop
children’s personality, talents, and mental and physical abilities, and realize their true potential
through learning to know oneself and others,

and make effective decisions to live harmonically together in the society. The Education for All
(2000) included life skills among the essential learning tool for survival, capacity development and
quality life. It also documented that all young people and adults have the “human right to benefit
from an education that includes learning to know, to do, to live together.” recognizing the
importance of living together as much as acquiring knowledge from an academic environment.
What is Basic Life Skills For?

• Objective: Young generations develop attitudes and beliefs in a positive manner so that they
contribute to Azerbaijani society and achieve success as they transition to adulthood, and the work

world.

• Target audience: The life skills lesson package is intended to apply to young generation aged 10 to
24 years old who come to Youth Houses aiming to creating a healthy condition to support and
advancement of youth initiatives.

• Expected outcome: Through life skills education, young generations are equipped with
foundational skills necessary for transitioning to productive adulthood; manage stress; learn to deal
with difficult emotions; practice positivism; improve self-esteem; feel empathy; learn to listen to
others carefully; learn to set personal boundary; handle dispute well; find balance between priorities
and demands; communicate confidently; set goals; make decisions; solve problems; think critically
and creatively; use executive functional skills; and learn to bounce back from adversity.

“I see these young people excited to have the opportunity to learn about topics that are

traditionally not covered in formal academic settings.”

Basic Life Skills Curriculum for Youth

The Basic Life Skills curriculum for the youth are based in evidence-based psychosocial methodology

including cognitive-behavioral therapy, mindfulness and resilience-building activities. These skills can
help youth better understand themselves, get along with others, and gain tools to cope with life’s
inevitable difficulties.

Self-awareness Interpersonal Skills Thinking Skills

1. Stress management 2. Emotional regulation 3. Positive thinking 4. Self-esteem 5. Empathy

6. Listening skills 7. Interpersonal effectiveness 8. Handling disputes 9. Managing relation- ships
10. Confident communication 11. Goal setting 12. Decision making 13. Problem solving
14. Critical and creative thinking 15. Executive function skills 16. Resilience (bouncing back from
adversity)

Total 16 topics are covered. Ideally, 2 lessons will be covered in a week in a 8-week session. Each
lesson is designed to be delivered for 90 mins for discussion, activities, and group work. However, it
is up to Youth House to choose how to deliver the lessons.

• Self-awareness — knowing and living with oneself: This theme covers topics that foster the
student’s relationship and under- standing of themselves including their thoughts, feelings and
behaviors.

• Interpersonal Skills — knowing and living with others: The lessons in this theme explore how to
establish healthy, respectful relation- ships; lessons highlight the use of non-violent communication,

assertiveness and dispute resolution.

• Thinking Skills — making effective decisions: The skills taught in this theme include concrete ways

of thinking and executing tasks so that youth will make effective decisions, set relevant goals, and
be informed consumers of information.

Progress of Basic Life Skills Curriculum for Youth

As a result of successful testing through the two pilot Youth Houses – in Baku-Binagadi and
Mingachevir, the UNICEF-developed Basic Life Skills programme was expanded to one more Youth
House supported by the Ministry of Youth and Sports, as well as three Career Centres supported by
the Youth

Foundation. In parallel, negotiations are held with the Ministry of Education with regards to possible

inclusion of the BLS programme into the formal education curriculum.

Life skills education is more than teaching skills

Today the buzz around life skills education for girls is at an all-time high. Policy and civil society
actors—from United Nations agencies to grassroots community-based organizations—have made
great strides developing life skills programming to help girls achieve a wide range of empowering
cognitive, health, social, economic, and political outcomes. But in many cases, such newfound
empowerment is met with violent backlash by family and community members, particularly when
girls attempt to apply skills like communication, negotiation, or leadership outside of the safe spaces
provided by a program. As a result, the burden of social change has been largely placed on the
shoulders of the girl-child.

At Brookings, we are examining how policy and civil society actors can do a better job shifting that
burden of change from girls themselves to her broader social and political context. As part of our
larger work on Skills for a Changing World, we’re asking questions about how girls’ life skills
programming can be better linked to transformative social change and the disruption of structural
inequalities that sustain barriers for girls and women.

One answer is that life skills education should be more than just about the girl’s own skills
development. Practitioners should also be focused on the girl’s agency (her capacity to see and to
make choices) and whether enabling opportunity structures (like policies, social norms, and
institutions) exist in her environment.

In our new framework on girls’ life skills education, we draw on the fields of gender empowerment
and the psychology of learning to help practitioners better design life skills programming that
connects girls’ life skills development not only to empowerment but also to wider social change.
We’ve summarized this into four guiding principles:

1. Consider a broader range of competencies

For starters, practitioners need to conceptualize life skills as a range of competencies (what one
can do) that enable girls (and boys) to function, thrive, and adapt in their lived realities, rather
than a narrow set of skills for life. These competencies are comprised of networks of Knowledge
(what one knows), Skills (what one has), and Attitudes (what one believes and values), or KSAs.
Conceptualizing life skills in this way well help encourage practitioners to be more purposeful
not only around the whats of life skills, but also the hows of applying such competencies to
navigate unique challenges at pivotal moments across her life and in different contexts.
 2. Design for five touch points in programming

Moving the focus of life skills programming beyond the girl means designing programs that begin
with 1) the dynamic process of building girls’ competencies, but continue on to focus on: 2)
whether the girl can translate her skills into 3) empowered action amidst a host of mediating
factors that can influence the degree to which her action is empowered. And, if actors seek to
achieve wider goals for girls and women, programs must also take into account 4) the range of
life outcomes impacted as well as whether 5) systemic change has been achieved. (Watch our
animation below for an illustration of how these five touch points come together.)

3. Be intentional about development and change

Evidence from the psychology of learning stresses the continuous, dialogical, and non-linear
nature of skills development over the child’s life. Life skills development is no different.
Practitioners must therefore be more intentional about building upon foundational KSAs
throughout key moments of the girl’s life, including early childhood through adolescence and
young adulthood.

But tied to development is change. This rings true not only at the individual level of the girl, but also
for her wider social context. As girls build KSAs important for her empowerment, there is a
consequent reaction and response by her peers, family, and community that must be accounted for
by programs. This interaction can lead to the strengthening of her agency, as well as to the
weakening of it.

4. Support girls to “read” context, gender, and power

Finally, if there is one “life skill” that we believe is foundational for girls, it is the ability to read
her social, political, and economic contexts with an understanding of how gender and power
have structured her realities and opportunities. Life skills programs must support girls to
recognize, navigate, and leverage the dynamic structures in her life if she is to translate KSAs
into empowered action. Without this, programs risk girls’ life skills development getting “stuck”
in the safe spaces in which they are learned.

RELATED CONTENT
As the girls’ education community continues to center life skills across program, donor, and
government policy priorities, we must ensure that actors take into account the urgent need to focus
on more than just the girl’s skills development—lest we continue to place the burden of social
change on girls themselves rather than on the gender unequal societies in which she lives. We
acknowledge that this will be difficult to apply in practice, but catalyzing transformative social
change has and will never be a straightforward process. Our hope is that by focusing on the above
four principles, policy and civil society actors will be to push the field even further to ensure that life
skills initiatives move girls and women toward both improved life outcomes and wider systemic
change.

What is Life Skills Education & why it is Important?

Life Skills Education

The development of a child can be made possible by keeping all aspects of their personality in mind.
This is the reason why Life Skill Education plays an important part in everyone’s life. In life skill
education, the overall personality of a child is taken into consideration. It gives strength to handle
any kind of situation and gives the courage to face struggle to achieve any target. By adding life skill
education to the school curriculum, better results can be achieved.

Here is the explanation of what is a life skill.

A life skill is used to describe basic skills acquired through learning or knowledge. Also, the daily
routine can be said to be a life skill. Life skills also can include the ability of your emotions, finances,
school performance, health, etc. If you are practicing life skills, so can improve a child’s esteem,
social competence, and confidence. You are increasing the life skills in your life.

Now, the exact life skills meaning is when the group of psychosocial competencies and interpersonal
skills that help people make decisions, build healthy, solve problems, communicate effectively, and
think critically and creatively. Maybe life skills are directed towards personal actions or actions
towards others.

Hence, the representation of what is a life skill. And life skills meaning.

What are Life Skills?

There are many definitions to understand what life skills are.

A person needs a set of social features and personal capabilities to interact with themselves and
other people in and around their environment and make a decision that requires high ability, also to
find solutions to various kinds of problems. Moreover, the skills required to deal positively with any
condition to get the desired outcome is called life skills. Life skills can be developed through
encouragement to adapt to society and promote positivity in personal behaviors and adopt a
positive perspective toward work.

What is Life Skill Education?

Life skills education is one such type of skill. Under this, the child develops the ability to discharge his
life appropriately and to organize the activities related to life in a systematic manner. It is a type of
education in which skills are developed to make the child efficient in such a way that he can make
decisions in odd situations by his ability and intelligence. At the same time, such miseries have to be
developed in human life. So that he can become a skilled citizen.

Importance of Life Skills Education

If we want to live life successfully, then we need to understand the importance of life skills. And it is
also very important to implement it in our life. If this happens then our life can move in a simple and
right direction. Life skills make us competent to know how to make our life easy and simple, how to
create a positive life, and how life can be spent in the right way. Therefore, life skills are very
important in our life.

It polishes the ability to adapt to all kinds of circumstances and succeed in every aspect of society.
Lack of life skills in the lives of new generations needs to be taken care of as it is important in life.
Due to the absence of life skills, not only personal lives but professional lives and careers get
affected.

By educating life skills, students can develop self-confidence in them. It makes them cooperative and
communicative. It prepares them to take quick action in any unfavorable circumstances.

Types of Life Skills

There are two types of life skills that need to be taught to students. The first one is General Life Skills
and the other is High-Level skills. And under these skills comes a variety of skills which are the
following.

General skills

Confidence skills.

Decision-making skills.

Stress alleviation skills.

Adjustment skills in adversity.

Self-awareness skills.

The skill of negative tendency towards wrongdoing.

Positive behavior.

Critical Thinking.

Society’s skills towards each other.

High-level skills

The following skills are covered under High-Level Skills.

Excellent warmth and high mental level.

Way of thinking.

Mental and physical relaxation.

Goal Setting and Problem Solving.

Communication.

Social support.

Standard of living with health.

Aims of Development of Life Skills

Following are the objectives for the development of life skills.

The purpose of social development.

Development of experimental knowledge.

The purpose of the development of adjustment power.

The objective of develops life values.

The objective of mental development.

Of all-round development

Essential Life Skills Everyone Should Learn

Developing life skills is important and every life skill has its importance to apply in life. Following are
life skills:

1. Self-Awareness Skills

By developing the Self-awareness skill, one can be aware of his/her doings. They will be aware of
their own performance and their behaviors which will make them competent to handle any
situation. A person will get to know his feelings for things or towards other people. It also helps
them to make sound decisions.

2. Empathy and Sympathy Skills

With Empathy, a person will be able to understand other people’s perceptions, feelings, and
circumstances any person is in. It simply puts them in someone’s place to understand their actual
emotions. It helps them to react accordingly.

With sympathy, a person will be able to show appreciation and compassion towards other people
and their emotional reactions.

3. Problem-Solving Skills

The life skill of problem-solving makes an individual trace a problem, suggest options to solutions,
evaluate the solutions to pick the best solution, and then apply the solution to the problem within
the time limit. It is one of the most important life skills to practice in life on an everyday basis.

4. Decision-Making Skills

Every now and then, an individual has to face times when they have to make a decision that can
affect their life. With decision-making skills, a person develops the skill to make the right and
appropriate decision and pass it on. Decision-making enables them to take decisions in any hard and
fast situation.

5. Thinking Skills

Developing thinking skill is very important as it is the mental activity by which an individual can
process information, use experiences, make relationships, finalize solutions to problems, pass on
decisions, ask questions, and suggest new ideas.

Thinking skills are of four types:

Analytical Thinking Skills: It is a visual thinking skill that makes an individual competent to break
complex problems into manageable components to solve them effectively.

Divergent Thinking Skills: With Divergent thinking skills, one can generate creative ideas after
working on or exploring many possible solutions. It is spontaneous and free-flow thinking.
Creative Thinking Skills: Creative thinking skill helps a person to create something new. It also allows
their brain to explore things and look at things in creative ways to suggest creative solutions.
Creative thinking is infused with imagination and it does not involve logical reasoning.

Critical Thinking Skills: Critical thinking skill is the opposite of creative thinking skill. It is the ability to
make a difference between fake truth and real truth, judgment, and opinion. It prepares a person to
think rationally and prepare to build trust in right and avoid wrong.

6. Communication skills

Without proper communication, you cannot express and make people understand your thinking and
it can be made possible by developing communication skills. It helps them to convey to people in a
very convincing and clear way. It develops confidence in people as well and good communication
skills help them in the professional environment too.

7. Interpersonal Skills

Interpersonal skills are basically interaction skills and social skills. This skill prepares an individual to
communicate socially in person or in a group. These skills have traits such as self-confidence, critical
thinking, communication skills, active listening, leadership, etc. To develop interpersonal skills, one
needs to start their day with an optimistic approach towards the day.

8. Accepting Criticism Skill

Accepting criticism is not easy but by developing this particular skill, one will be able to be open to
constructive criticism and improve themselves according to that criticism. An individual should keep
their emotional side and accept the truth to work on it.