10 ABSTRACT OF THE CSI ANNUAL REPORT 2014/2015 | Draft translation adaptation and preparation of children for the first year of compulsory school attendance and education of children in preparatory classes and the preparatory stage of special primary schools. Moreover, health education focused on the development of healthy eating; physical skills of pupils and their physical fitness were other monitored areas. Other tasks of the Czech School Inspectorate in elementary schooling included: checking on the safety of pupils in schools, educating pupils in socially excluded localities and education of pupils with a different mother tongue. Furthermore, a sample survey focused on the results of pupils of the ninth grades of primary schools and the corresponding grade in grammar schools in sciences and social sciences was conducted through the inspection electronic system of testing InspIS SET. An integral part of inspection activities the Czech School Inspectorate have been organizing and conducting international surveys. In 2015, apart from the piloting survey PIRLS 2016, two main data collections were conducted: PISA 2015 and TIMSS 2015. Summary of Inspection Activity Positive Findings • The sphere of primary education is characterized by stability in the offer of educational institutions and facilities and availability of school/school facilities for children. Also, due to favourable demographic trends, the capacities of elementary schools increase to cover higher demand. • An increasing number of pupils with SEN is entering mainstream education. This trend was caused, among other things, by the amendment of relevant decrees that supported individual integration of pupils with SEN into mainstream elementary schools. The amendment also made the presence of an assistant teacher in the classroom possible or more available; and (through clearly defined rules of cooperation) simplified communication between experts from the school counselling facilities and the school teachers. An assistant teacher for students with disabilities was available in 55.4% of the monitored elementary schools. • Schools are more successful in ensuring smooth adaptation of children entering elementary education. Generally, elementary schools put these strategies among their priorities. In this area, schools successfully cooperate with nursery schools, parents of the children and school counselling facilities. Professional psychological care was most often provided outside an elementary school (in 82.1% of the cases). Services of an external psychologist were used by 18.4% of schools; internal school psychologist was available in 13.1% of schools. • The rate of active cooperation between teachers in the school and between schools is also increasing. Mutual class and lesson observations are gradually put into practice by basic school teachers. These feedback strategies are used by approximately one fifth of the teachers. • Schools are successful in developing cooperation with other partners of the school, especially parents, and direct it to a specific area of education. Some form of a partnership was actively developed by a total of 98.1% of elementary schools. In addition to working closely with their obvious partners (guardians of pupils or school counselling facilities), the schools cooperated prevailingly with other schools (80.3%) and partners in their municipalities or regions. Their cooperation lied mostly in organizing or preparing different cultural events (88.9%). Approximately half of the schools also closely cooperate with non-governmental organizations. • In the area of material conditions of elementary schools, there was a shift from focusing on ICT equipment to other teaching aids. The quality of teaching is increasing due to the efficient use of modern teaching aids and increasing competencies of teachers in their use. The Czech School Inspectorate findings showed schools are well equipped with ICT (only 0.1% of schools have shortcomings in this area) and availability of teaching aids for pupils is also very good. Effectiveness of the use of teaching aids (used in 96.5% lessons) then contributes to the quality of the teaching.