Transforming Islamic Religious Education through Digital Role Playing

Abstrak

This study examines how Islamic Religious Education learning can be transformed through Digital Role Playing as an innovative strategy for increasing students' learning interest at SMP Negeri 23 Makassar. The study was motivated by the tendency of Islamic Religious Education lessons to be delivered through conventional, one-way instruction, which often limits students' active participation, emotional engagement, and contextual understanding of Islamic values. Digital Role Playing is positioned as a pedagogical transformation because it integrates role simulation, digital media, collaborative interaction, and reflective value internalization in the learning process. This research employed a quantitative approach with a correlational design. Data were collected using a Likert-scale questionnaire, supported by observation and documentation, and analyzed through descriptive statistics, validity and reliability testing, simple linear regression, t-test, and coefficient of determination using SPSS. The findings show that the implementation of Digital Role Playing reached an average score of 4.09, categorized as good, while students' learning interest reached an average score of 4.20, categorized as high. Regression analysis produced a t-count of 7.813 with a significance value of 0.000, indicating a positive and significant influence of Digital Role Playing on students' learning interest. The coefficient of determination was 0.449, meaning that Digital Role Playing contributed 44.9% to the variation in students' learning interest. These findings confirm that transforming Islamic Religious Education through Digital Role Playing can create a more interactive, contextual, reflective, and value-oriented learning experience. The method is therefore recommended for broader use by Islamic Religious Education teachers seeking to strengthen student engagement and religious value internalization in the digital era.