Teaching Bahasa Indonesia Using Rendra’s Ballad Nyanyian Angsa (Swan Song)

Abstract

Many young Bahasa Indonesia (BI) teachers teaching BI as a foreign language lack experience with instructional materials because there have not been enough BI textbooks for this purpose. Apart from this, students may need something more interesting and fresher. It is, therefore, necessary for teachers to be innovative and creative in developing instructional materials like using poems. Literature in the target language can become a rich source to be exploited for this purpose. The tasks may focus both on linguistic competence and literary competence as well as values found in the work. This paper is trying to show how Nyanyian Angsa (Swan Song), a ballad by Rendra, an famous Indonesian poet, can be used to create instructional materials. The method used in creating the materials is the WH-model. For vocabulary (kosa kata), one has to think of words in relation to, for example, collocation as in 'makanan cepat saji', connotation as in "makan hati', appropriateness as in not using 'kamu' or 'kau' for an older or respectful person, etc. For reading comprehension, since the poem is for advanced level, tasks created should approximate those that can be handled by native speakers of BI, for example, "Siapakah yang dimaksudkan dengan 'seorang lelaki' dalam puisi itu?"; for expressions, one can ask question like "Apakah makna 'Malaikat penjaga Firdaus' dalam puisi itu?"; for grammar (tata bahasa), one can create tasks, for example, on the affix /ke-an/ or the infix /-i-/ like in gigi>gerigi, etc. The poem may be dramatized with students assigned to play the role of a certain character, or students may also be assigned to produce a video. For values in the poem, students may be assigned to find issues related to the Seven Deadly Sins. To conclude, one can see that Nyanyian Angsa can be created with imagination to result in very effective instructional materials.