Primary – Indonesian Language A Poems

As part of their Sharing the Planet unit, in Language A Indonesian, 5th grade students were inquiring into the different ecosystems. They read texts about ecosystems and their issues and brainstormed some ideas of how they can help the environment.

Students were also learning to express their ideas about the environment and its issues in the form of poetry. They were introduced to Indonesian poetry reading and writing by first looking closely at the different ecosystems and then using the thinking routine‘Looking 10 x 2’ to complete the following prompts: list 20 words to describe what you see in the image use both nouns and adjectives, be descriptive. Then write 2 questions about what you see in the image. The results of this looking and these prompts helped the students write their own poems.

Students read and explored some poems to learn more about the common elements of poetry such as structure, rhyme, rhythm and figurative language.  They used the thinking routine Notice / Think / Wonder to analyze and annotate the poems written by Indonesian authors.Students also answered questions along the way.


Next, each student picked a poem to analyze and then to represent through watercolor painting. Along with their watercolor, they shared the annotated poem. Lastly, they will present a short essay providing background for their artwork and how it demonstrates their interpretation of the poem.