This structured Australian poetry analysis resource is built around Banjo Paterson’s entertaining bush ballad Mulga Bill’s Bicycle and is designed to strengthen poetry comprehension, close reading, and analytical paragraph writing in High School English classrooms.
Through guided analysis, students examine themes such as Australian identity, pride, resistance to change, and tall poppy syndrome, while exploring humour, narrative voice, and poetic structure. The workshop format supports skill development in a manageable, focused way — making it ideal for a short poetry study or exam preparation sequence.
Planned to run across approximately 2 – 3 lessons, this unit offers clear scaffolding with minimal teacher preparation required.
This Poetry Comprehension Task is suitable for:
• Australia – Years 9 – 10
• New Zealand – Years 10 – 11
• UK – Years 9 – 10 (Key Stage 4)
• USA – Grades 9 – 10
What’s included in this Secondary English poetry resource:
• A focused reference list of key poetic techniques
• A structured close reading analysis framework
• A targeted language features task concentrating on selected techniques
• Four differentiated extension activities for deeper thinking
• A marking guide aligned to analytical writing criteria
• Teacher reference notes with model analysis ideas
This poetry unit helps students:
• Develop close reading and annotation skills
• Analyse tone, imagery, narrative voice, and structure
• Strengthen analytical paragraph writing
• Practise evidence-based responses
• Engage critically with classic Australian bush poetry
Teachers value this resource because it is:
• Low-prep and classroom-ready
• Flexible for whole-class teaching, independent study, or relief lessons
• Appropriately scaffolded for lower secondary learners
• Aligned with exam-style and assessment-focused writing tasks
This Mulga Bill’s Bicycle poetry analysis unit provides an engaging and practical way to teach Australian bush poetry while building essential High School English comprehension and analytical writing skills.
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Years 7-11
10 pages
3-4 lessons
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