Impact of Implementation the Merdeka Curriculum on the Effectiveness of Children's Learning Styles: A Review Based on Gender and Subject

Background/purpose. The Merdeka Curriculum is an important aspect in the reform of Indonesian education in facing global challenges and industry 4.0. Its early implementation requires comprehensive analyses and evaluations to determine its effectiveness. This study aims to determine the effectiveness of elementary school students' learning styles (auditory, visual, and kinesthetic) in terms of gender and subjects. Materials/methods. This study employed a mixed-methods research design using purposive sampling. Data were collected through teacher interviews and the compilation of students' daily test scores in Mathematics and Indonesian subjects. Results. The analysis results with the general linear model (GLM) test show differences in average scores as a form of learning style effectiveness in terms of gender, specifically in mathematics. In detail, male students with visual learning styles have the most dominant average score (84 points) in math, and with kinesthetic learning styles in Indonesian (84.5 points). Through the ANOVA test, it was also obtained significant (>α 0.05) that there was no difference in the effectiveness of each learning style in terms of each subject. The N-gain score test results were also obtained (>55%) for the effectiveness of each learning style in terms of each subject, which was stated to be in the moderately effective category. Conclusion. In general, the effectiveness of learning styles in terms of subjects fluctuates. Some of these results indicate that the implementation of the Merdeka curriculum at the primary school level has been able to encompass and equalize students' learning style preferences with the same learning outcomes or achievements.