Changing the curriculum is an effort made by the government to improve
the quality of education. The merdeka curriculum is the latest curriculum
implemented by the government in schools. In its application, sometimes
educators and education personnel experience challenges, especially for
perception of pre-service English teacher who practice teaching in schools. Thus,
it requires a long adaptation because this is still classified as something new for
educators and education personnel. This research is to find out the challenges
faced by pre-service teachers when implementing the merdeka curriculum in
teaching practice at school.
This study aims (1) to find out the challenges faced by pre-service English
teachers in implementing merdeka curriculum when teaching practice 2 program,
and (2) to find out the perceptions of pre-service English teacher in implementing
merdeka curriculum when teaching practice 2 program. This study is a qualitative
research using the Narrative Inquiry method to find out the experiences of pre�service teachers in implementing the merdeka curriculum, especially the
challenges they face and how do they perception the merdeka curriculum. In
collecting data, the researcher conducted interviews with ten respondents of
English students class of 2020 who had done teaching practice 2 programs in
seventh semester with eight questions.
The results show that pre-service English teacher experience several varied
challenges in implementing the merdeka curriculum, namely difficulties in
designing teaching modules, difficulties in class management, lack of knowledge
of the merdeka curriculum, lack of readiness skill like self-preparation in
conducting lessons, difficulties in making teaching media, and lack of IT facilities
at school and understanding of IT. In addition, pre-service English teachers'
perceptions in implementation merdeka curriculum majority show positive which
the implementation of merdeka curriculum can facilitate educators in the
teaching and learning process and provide freedom for students to learn according
to their interests to make them creative and active in the classroom. While the
others show negative implications, which with the implementation of the merdeka
curriculum makes pre-service English teacher face several challenges that make
them dizzy and confused.