Yarova O. The Tendencies in the Development of Primary Education in the European Union Countries

The thesis investigates the phenomenon of primary education in the EU countries in a comparative pedagogical aspect. The main attention is focused on the tendencies in education development at ISCED 1 within the unity of its common characteristics. In order to characterize the transformations taking place at the organizational, content and management levels, primary education is considered in the historical-cultural contexts of the member states against the background of global and regional challenges of our time. The philosophical and pedagogical traditions, key psychological and sociological theories that determine the functioning of the primary school in the European educational space at the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries have been analyzed. The analysis of primary education goals in the EU countries proves their dependence on external factors that by nature can have economic, political, sociological, educational, philosophical or combined character. The goals of modern primary education are manifested in emphasizing the universal, fundamental values of Western civilization such as the establishment of a unique individuality of each child, development of his ability to think critically and make independent decisions, the importance of social cooperation and multiculturalism. It has been found that the key aspect of developing standards of primary education in the EU countries is the transition from structuring the content of curricula around subjects to the consolidation of disciplines in integrated blocks and broad educational fields. The optimization tendencies in organizing educational process at primary school in the EU countries have been found in the choice of a primary school model relative to ISCED 2, cycling the educational process, lowering the schooling age, grouping students, reducing the teacher/pupil ratio at class level, and age adapting regime. In assessing the performance of junior schoolchildren have been revealed such innovations as internationalization of assessment; dissemination of national assessment; specification of assessment criteria and expected results from the point of view of curriculum implementation; application of a complex assessment for obtaining objective information on students' progress; introduction of entrance testing to determine the child's readiness for schooling; publication of both general and specific information on the results of national tests; the expansion of the list of disciplines in national testing; and ICT application. In the context of school autonomy and self-governance development in European educational systems at ISCED 1 have been characterized the tendencies of introducing school-based management as a tool for primary school democratization, school councils' development, expansion and change of professional responsibilities of school principals and teachers. The current general tendencies of development of school inspectorate system at ISCED 1 in the EU countries have been fixed: creation of national school inspection framework on the principles of harmonious interaction of external and internal inspections, balancing national standards and regional needs, taking into account school context; use of school inspection mechanisms for improving the efficiency of primary schools; growing role of school self-evaluation which enables solving the problems of not only a single school but also stimulating systemic changes; dissemination of a new model of risk assessment; expansion of school inspections through participation of school boards and parents in evaluation procedures; development of national databases accumulating information on quantitative and qualitative indicators of educational institutions. There has also been traced the evolution of theoretical and regulatory foundations of primary education in Ukraine, and the main directions of its modernization have been determined. The author has drawn conclusions about the prospects of using the progressive experience of the EU countries in creating a new Ukrainian school