Regional Representative Banjarmasin held an event on June 15 and 16, 2015. This event focused on education since the previous event dealt with environmental care. The background of this event was that literary works could actually be used for teaching language because they have a complementary relationship. Poetry as one of the literary works is a good alternative for teaching language. It has several advantages for enabling the students to apply their knowledge in context since it gives real examples related to the context where and when it happens, broadening their imagination and creativity, making them more interested in learning English, enriching the students’ vocabularies and more importantly changing the paradigm that writing and understanding poetry were difficult. Therefore, the idea of introducing poetry in a fun way will benefit the students in some ways.

This event invited the students from an English course in Banjarmasin namely American Language Training (ALT) which was located on Belitung Darat street. This course provided several classes with different levels. The students who joined this event were totally 45 students from elementary school until senior high school students. Twenty nine students from Monday and Thursday classes joined the event on June 15 meanwhile sixteen students from Tuesday and Friday classes joined the event on June 16. The event itself began with the presentation about poetry. After that, they practiced writing poetry especially acrostic in – groups of four. During the practice, the volunteers consisting of VDMS alumni, VDMS grantees and ALT tutors assisted them. After that, they were asked to submit their best poetry for scoring. While waiting for the scoring, all poetry was placed on a wall magazine. The students whose poetry was the best got a certificate from the ALT manager.

Hopefully, by doing this activity, students can love English more. We also hoped that it is boosting their confidence and motivating them since their writings were appreciated. Yet, it encourages the other children who do not join ALT to find out that learning English in ALT was fun. There were 4 grantees and alumni of VDMS and 4 tutors of ALT Banjarmasin who coordinated this event.