THE IMPLEMENTATION OF INDEPENDENT CURRICULUM: TEACHERS’ PERCEPTION AND DIFFICULTIES ON DEVELOPING A LESSON PLAN

Abstract

The national education curriculum in Indonesia has been shifted from Curriculum 2013 to Independent Curriculum (Kurikulum Merdeka) in some schools. It ended up with quite many changes in various aspects which required teachers to adapt to it. Adapting to a new curriculum is not that simple as reflected by multiple problems occurring in the previous curriculum that is still happening now. This research article aims to report the implementation of the Independent Curriculum as the current curriculum applied in Indonesia. The implementation focused on its lesson plan practice. This study investigated the English teachers’ perception and difficulties in developing a lesson plan based on the Independent Curriculum. This study employed a mixed method design with 9 participants of English teachers from 8 different high schools (junior high school, senior high school, and vocational high school) around Bandung Regency, Indonesia. The instrument used to gather the data was a questionnaire consisting of statements and open-ended questions. The result of this study revealed that most English teachers have a good perception on developing a lesson plan in Independent Curriculum. Despite it, the teachers still faced some difficulties in developing a lesson plan based on the format of the Independent Curriculum, such as determining the lesson objectives by themselves, understanding the format of the lesson plan, developing the indicators of achievement, assessment, and enriching the instrument, developing a lesson plan which is suitable with students’ needs, and understanding the terms in the Independent Curriculum. Therefore, it is considered a crucial act to do more socialization, supervision, and training for teachers to improve their quality in terms of understanding the Independent Curriculum, lesson plan, and its implementation.

Keywords: Independent Curriculum, Lesson plan, teachers’ perception, teachers’ difficulty