Development of RPG Maker-Based Games to Enhance Students' Mathematical Connections
Mathematics learning in schools often requires innovative approaches to make abstract concepts more concrete and engaging for students. In particular, digital game-based learning has emerged as an effective strategy for increasing motivation and deepening conceptual understanding. Mathematical connection is an important competency for understanding the relationships among mathematical ideas, concepts, and procedures; however, most students still struggle to apply this ability, especially when solving geometry problems. This research aims to develop learning media in the form of a game using RPG Maker to enhance students' mathematical connection abilities in geometric transformations. The educational game learning media was designed and developed using the ADDIE development model, which consists of five stages: Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation, and Evaluation. Instruments included expert validation sheets, student response questionnaires, and pretest-posttest assessments to measure media validity, practicality, and effectiveness. The results show that the RPG Maker-based learning media is highly valid, with an average expert validation score of 87.0% from media experts and 86.0% from material experts. Students also rated the media as very practical, with an average score of 84.2%. Learning improvement from this media is evident in the increase in the average student score from 70.14 on the pretest to 89.17 on the posttest. Furthermore, the non-parametric Wilcoxon test confirmed a statistically significant difference (Z = -5.25, p < .001). This improvement is also supported by a large effect size (d = 3.63) and an average N-Gain of 0.57, which falls into the moderate category. These findings indicate that the RPG Maker-based learning media is valid, practical, and holds potential to enhance students' mathematical connection skills in geometry transformation learning, offering an engaging solution for abstract mathematical learning.
Keywords: mathematical connections, geometric transformations, learning media, RPG maker, ADDIE model.
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