Innovative Game-Based Digital Media to Improve General Life Skills of Primary School Students: A Development Study in the Context of Education 5.0

Introduction: The use of engaging and interactive digital learning media is essential to enhance students' motivation and life skills, particularly in Pancasila Education at the primary school level. This study aims to develop a digital-based educational game as a learning resource for Pancasila Education and to test the feasibility, effectiveness, and user responses to the developed media. Methods: This research employs the Research and Development method using the ADDIE model (Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation, and Evaluation). The universe of this study comprised all fifth-grade students at elementary schools in Gubug Subdistrict, Grobogan Regency, East Java, Indonesia, while the sample consisted of 80 fifth-grade students from SDN 1 Jeketro and SDN 1 Saban, selected using a purposive sampling technique. Data collection techniques included observation, interviews, questionnaires, and tests. Quantitative data analysis involved descriptive analysis for media feasibility and inferential analysis using paired t-tests to measure media effectiveness. Qualitative analysis was used to explore user responses and the implementation of media in the classroom, conducted through data reduction, data presentation, and conclusion drawing. Results: The results of this study show that: (1) The developed educational game media is highly feasible to be used as a learning resource for Pancasila Education for fifth-grade students, as evidenced by material expert validation results of 97.5% and media expert validation results of 93.7%; (2) The use of this media effectively improves students' General Life Skills significantly, with an average difference in pre-test and post-test scores of 8.00 points at SDN 1 Jeketro and 8.18 points at SDN 1 Saban, and test results showing statistical significance; (3) The educational game media received positive responses from teachers and students, demonstrated through active participation in learning and a very good practicality rating. Conclusions: The conclusion of this study is that the educational game media has been proven to improve students’ General Life Skills and can be recommended as an innovative learning tool for civic education at the primary school level.