The paper classifies and generalizes innovative technologies for assessing the competencies and skills of the 21st century students in the education system. Taking into account the requirements of the international academic community, criteria for assessing students' competencies in the context of the formation of functional literacy, the ability to study and evaluate independence, global competence and meta-subject skills (soft skills) are considered. The necessity of ensuring continuity of assessment of students' competencies at the levels of general and higher education, as well as the results of formative assessment as an integrative innovative educational technology for the formation, control and evaluation of educational achievements, is emphasized. The possibilities of formative assessment for the development of meta-subject competencies of students are considered. It contains information on the innovative Evidence-Centered Design competency assessment methodology, which contributes to the further development of control and evaluation activities to ensure reliable and valid assessment of students’ achievements and quality assurance in a competency-based approach.

Annotation. This paper considers methodological approaches to the assessment of learning achievement, analysing the impact of the mark on learning motivation of students. External testing and subsequent questionnaires data may serve as an indicator of increasing learning motivation of students due to their confidence in the assessment results. Reliability of assessment is an incentive to enhance learning activities of students and increase interest in a given academic discipline. We observed difficulties of obtaining an objective assessment in schools and possible ways of overcoming them. The research provides the basic provisions of the assessment using the design pattern of assessment tools and processes on the basis of evidence-based arguments modelled on Evidence Centered Design which provides assistance in the development of high-quality assessment tools. The use of patterns may allow educators to make greater use of methods for classifying, organising and planning the assessment of cognitive and competency-based learning outcomes.

The new era creates new opportunities and poses a number of challenges for education to adapt to the emerging prospects of digital transformation of educational activities. The article provides a brief analysis of domestic and foreign works on the problems of digitalization in education. It is shown that, along with the benefits offered by the digital space, there are many problems of its use in educational activities. The solution of these problems is primarily associated with the training of teachers to use new opportunities for the organization and implementation of distance learning forms, the development of their digital competencies. At the same time, it has been shown that in both foreign and domestic universities, students in their majority prefer contact forms of classes and want a live dialogue with teachers, despite their rather high digital literacy. Therefore, the emerging digital didactics is very important to determine the ratio of traditional and distance learning will be able to provide a comfortable learning environment and a high level of training of future specialists. These and other questions can be answered by digital didactics, which has not yet been developed by scientists and educational practitioners.

Given scientific research is devoted to the consideration of factors influencing educational (learning) motivation. One such factor is the assessment of academic achievements. The difficulties of obtaining an objective assessment in educational practice are noted and possible ways to overcome them are shown, including through external (independent) standardized testing. Authentic assessment requires special training and the creation of an appropriate base, this problem can be solved in the form of organizational and methodological support of teachers by external professional centers providing assessment in the form of an educational audit. The data of external testing and subsequent questionnaires are presented, allowing to judge about changes in the educational motivation of school students in the assessment process. The need to identify the progress of individual achievements in the educational process requires the development and introduction of new assessment forms that create the confidence of students in assessments and affect educationalmotivation.

The article provides a theoretical analysis of the organisation of "excellence" education in school practice. It presents sound implementation principles of "excellence acmeological" approach to teaching in rural schools and necessary organizational and pedagogical conditions of quality education with the involvement of highly qualified teachers to ensure the educational process and increase the motivation of students to study. The paper proposes organizational and technological implementation model of "excellence acmeological" teaching in rural schools. An objective assessment of the achievement of the expected results is ensured when educational organizations turn to qualified assessment centers in order to assess the level of training among students. Much attention is given to the problems of formation and evaluation of competencies of general secondary education graduates. The excellence acmeological idea of development and self-development directs an individual to become a successful person and a highly qualified specialist.