СФЕРА НЕФОРМАЛЬНОЇ ОСВІТИ ЯК ЗАСІБ САМОРЕАЛІЗАЦІЇ ОСОБИСТОСТІ ВПРОДОВЖ ЖИТТЯ: ЄВРОПЕЙСЬКИЙ ВИМІР

This article presents the European Union as the highly developed international association that occupies leading positions in the global political and economic stage. The educational sector holds an important place in the development of the European society. It’s defined by the main strategic of the EU: A European strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth («Europe – 2020»), Strategic Framework for European Cooperation in Education and Training («ET –2020»). The issue of building a knowledge society is important for modern Europe. The involving person to lifelong learning is the key to the personal success and the effective development of society in general. This causes the diversification of the educational system that promotes the development of different forms of learning. All these basic modern educational trends of the EU are considered in the article. The Ukrainian scientists’ searches in the field of non-formal education systematically analyzed according to the age categories of the participants in the educational process. The objective of this work is defining the role of the non-formal education in the cognitive and creative personal development due to the European concept of the lifelong learning.A variety of research methods was used to achieve this goal. The foreign scientific views on the phenomenon of lifelong education are analyzed. The value of the integration of the formal, non-formal and informal education in the general sense of the concept of the lifelong learning is underlined in the article. The variability in the interpretation of the concept “non-formal education” is shown, a determination of this conceptas an independent social and educational spheres is made. The model of the person involvement to various spheres of educational activitiesthroughout the life is presented in the article. The essence of the concept of “non-formal education” is clarified; the main characteristics of this educational sphere are given. The peculiarities of the self-realization of the persons of different ages through the involvement of non-formal educational activities are emphasized. The activities of the European international organizations as the major stakeholders in non-formal education are structured. The prospects for the further research in view of the development of the informal education in Ukraine are defined.