Аннотация:This paper examines the formation problem of pupils' life skills in the context of addressing the challenge of improving the education quality. Analysis by academic and methodological literature showed that the mastering of life skills by schoolchildren is primarily connected with the reinforcement of practice-oriented education. The reinforcement of links between education and the modern-life realities, a fuller account of pupils' needs and demands brought about by the necessity of adapting to social reality and the overcoming of the overly academic element in school education are considered the most important ways of improving its quality. A necessary pedagogical condition for tackling the problem of formation of pupils' life skills is the recognition by teachers of the importance of the problem, an understanding of the result-achieving possibilities afforded by the subjects they teach and a grasp of the appropriate methodological tools and techniques. To identify aspects of training teachers in tackling this task, we conducted a survey of a sizeable group of teachers of history and social studies, as the latter directly addresses the question of modernity. The survey showed that the teachers were sufficiently able to identify the basic elements of the skill set associated with the “life skills” notion. In indicating the problems pupils have in appropriating these skills and the ways of overcoming them, the teachers limited themselves to judgments touching upon the situation in education and gave little emphasis to the possibilities afforded by, and the specific nature of, the subjects they teach.