Improving Students' Cognitive Abilities in Invasion Games Through Deep Learning: Strengthening Kurikulum Merdeka

Study purpose. The Merdeka Curriculum promotes deep learning to foster meaningful, mindful, and joyful learning experiences that support higher-order thinking skills. In physical education, however, cognitive development is often overshadowed by psychomotor-oriented instruction. This study examined the effect of a deep learning approach on elementary school students’ cognitive abilities in invasion games. Materials and Methods. The study employed a randomized pretest–posttest controlled experimental design involving 57 fifth-grade students. Participants were randomly allocated to either the intervention group (n = 29), which participated in an invasion games program grounded in deep learning principles, or the comparison group (n = 28), which received instruction through conventional teaching methods. The intervention consisted of eight sessions involving soccer and basketball activities. Data were collected using a 25-item cognitive ability test assessing invasion game concepts, spatial awareness, decision making, tactical understanding, game analysis, and problem solving. The instrument demonstrated high content validity (Aiken’s V = 0.89) and reliability (KR-20 = 0.88). Data analysis involved descriptive statistics, Shapiro–Wilk and Levene’s tests, paired- and independent-samples t-tests, N-Gain analysis, and Cohen’s d effect size estimation. Results. Validity and reliability analyses supported the instrument’s adequacy for data collection. Both groups demonstrated statistically significant improvements from pre-test to post-test (p < .05); however, the magnitude of change differed between them. The experimental group achieved a high normalized gain (N-Gain = 0.71), whereas the control group showed a moderate gain (N-Gain = 0.39). Further comparative analysis confirmed a significant difference in cognitive improvement between the groups (p < .001), accompanied by a large effect size (Cohen’s d = 1.12) Conclusions. The deep learning approach effectively enhances students’ cognitive abilities in invasion games and supports the implementation of the Merdeka Curriculum in physical education. Future studies should investigate its long-term effectiveness across diverse educational contexts and learning domains.