Introduction. The article substantiates social demands for paradigm of self-education in the absence of optimal ways to comprehend the increasing flow of scientific and technical information and enhance personal responsibility in mastering professional and multi-professional competences, mostly in knowledge-intensive fields of production, and due to the qualification-based stratification of society.

Materials and Methods. The study actualizes the leading role of students’ interaction with the object of learning manifested in self-education. The paper also provides a definition of self-educational activity. The convergence of research solutions is achieved by taking into account the multifunctional role of self-education, comprehensiveness, completeness and effectiveness of the constituent actions. Through the activity approach, the author identifies basic and supplementary self-education actions, and their operational structure. The theoretical insights could be implemented in the system of higher education through revision of curricula and educational programs, improvement of methodological supply, combination of traditional and innovative forms of lesson planning, and the by use of meta-educational and intra-educational technologies.

Results. Strategy and tactics for self-education activity management has been elaborated with the use of verification methods and the level of self-education competence as a criterion, including level of training, trainability, experience, and self-education orientation.

Discussion. The pedagogical experiment aimed at developing self-education activity in students discovered the level of their self-education competence. Control groups mostly showed the first and second level, while self-education competence of students in experimental groups was developed to the third and fourth levels.

Conclusion. The represented data show the efficiency of the method designed and future development of fundamental issues of self-education activity of students.

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