ABSTRACT
Education has an essential role in preparing human resources for a favorable nation and country’s progress. With modernization and globalization posing challenges to its current state, there is a growing need for strategies to improve teaching and learning to balance development and technology. In Indonesia, the five-day school week program is regulated by Article 2 of the Ministerial Regulation (Permendikbud), which states that students must attend schools eight hours a day or 40 hours over the course of five days per week. Through this program, teachers are supposed to be able to develop more creative learning plans so that assignments can be completed at schools. Students are also expected to be able to maximize their participation in co-curricular and extracurricular activities offered by the school for their potential development. Many research findings confirm that the five-day school week policy brings about changes in students and teachers. For instance, since students expend their energy at schools, fatigue and fewer additional activities outside of school becomes prevalent. Similarly, teachers and education personnel spend most of their time at school, and their performance in delivering learning materials in afternoon classes thereby diminishes. This study was intended to provide an overview and identify the curricular effectiveness of the five-day school week by literature review. It revealed that in Indonesia, the five-day school week program was not optimally implemented due to several factors, including the physical factors underlying teacher and student’s performance and the psychological, economic, and sociological factors that shape the character education of students and their level of relationship with the parents.
