ASDAN’s regulated Personal Progress qualifications, designed for learners working at Pre-Entry Level and Entry Level 1 — including learners with profound and multiple learning difficulties, severe learning difficulties, and learners on the early stages of communication and engagement.
Personal Progress recognises tiny, demonstrable progress as legitimate evidence of learning. It is structured to make visible the work that learners working at very early levels are doing, in a way that commissioners and external moderators can recognise as accredited learning.
Unit territory
Personal Progress units cluster around early developmental and life-skills areas:
- Engaging with stimuli — sensory engagement; recognition of familiar people, objects, sounds; early communication
- Communicating with others — using sign, symbol, AAC, voice; making preferences known; responding to others
- Personal care — early self-help skills (washing, dressing, eating, toileting) at the level the learner is working at
- Healthy living — exercise, food, sleep at a basic engagement level
- Engaging with the world — exploring environments; recognising routines; participating in shared activities
- Working in a group — co-existing with others; turn-taking; responding to others’ presence and contributions
- Encountering literacy — early book-sharing; symbol recognition; recognising and responding to one’s own name
- Encountering numeracy — early number, measure, and shape; counting in routines
- Engaging with leisure activities — choosing and participating in age-appropriate leisure
- Travel and mobility — moving in familiar and unfamiliar environments
Who this is for at NEO
As with Towards Independence, Personal Progress is likely a smaller portion of NEO’s cohort because the NEO offer presupposes a level of communication and digital access that is above the typical Personal Progress learner profile.
Personal Progress is the right ASDAN choice when:
- A learner is working at Pre-Entry or Entry 1 with significant SEND
- A learner’s EHCP specifies Personal Progress as the appropriate qualification target
- A learner is in NEO’s offer through an unusual referral (e.g. transition from another setting; complex circumstances) and a regulated qualification at this level is required
In these cases, Personal Progress provides Ofqual-regulated recognition of learning that other qualification structures cannot reach.
Tests canonical
- Life and Work — full canonical branch
- Life and Work — Independent living (personal care, daily living)
- Life and Work — Functional English (early communication, encountering literacy)
- Life and Work — Functional Maths (encountering numeracy)
Cornerstone fits
All six Cornerstones depending on unit choice. Particularly strong fits with Connection (engagement, communication), Movement (mobility and physical exploration), and Rest (regulation, sleep, gentle pacing).
Preparing for Adulthood (PfA) anchor
Personal Progress contributes to all four PfA outcomes in the form they take for learners with PMLD — supported employment / day occupation, supported living, supported relationships and community, and ongoing health-and-wellbeing support. The accreditation makes those outcomes commissioner-visible.
NEO operational note
For learners for whom Personal Progress is the right qualification, NEO needs to be honest about the model fit. A fully online provision is not always the best mode for learners working at Pre-Entry or Entry 1 — direct human support, sensory-rich physical environments, and one-to-one delivery often serve better. Where NEO is part of the answer for a Personal Progress learner, the practitioner co-ordinates closely with the commissioner, family, and any other providers in the learner’s plan.
Source
ASDAN — Personal Progress qualifications (publicly available). Full unit handbook required for outcome-level tagging.