Learn Hardcore Indonesian: Setelah diskusi, guru membagikan kuesioner singkat tentang perasaan murid di sekolah. - After the discussion, the teacher hands out a short questionnaire about students’ feelings at school.

“Setelah” and “sesudah” are near-synonyms. In most everyday contexts, you can swap them without changing the meaning:
- Setelah diskusi ≈ Sesudah diskusi = After the discussion

Differences are subtle:

“Setelah” is a bit more common in spoken Indonesian and feels slightly more neutral.
“Sesudah” often sounds a bit more formal or bookish, but is still very common.

In your sentence, using either “Setelah diskusi” or “Sesudah diskusi” is correct and natural.

Is the comma after “diskusi” necessary? Could I say it without the comma or move the phrase?

The comma is stylistically recommended, but not absolutely required in casual writing.

With a fronted time phrase, Indonesian typically uses a comma:
- Setelah diskusi, guru membagikan kuesioner…

You can also change the word order:

Guru membagikan kuesioner singkat setelah diskusi.
(No comma needed here; the time phrase comes at the end.)

Both are correct. The version with the comma just separates the introductory time phrase from the main clause, similar to English.

Is “diskusi” a verb (to discuss) or a noun (discussion)? Could I say “berdiskusi” here?

In “Setelah diskusi”, “diskusi” is functioning as a noun: “after the discussion”.

diskusi = discussion (noun)
berdiskusi = to discuss / to have a discussion (verb phrase)

You could rephrase using “berdiskusi”:

Setelah berdiskusi, guru membagikan kuesioner…
= After discussing / after having a discussion, the teacher distributed…

Both versions are grammatical and natural; the original emphasizes the discussion as an event (noun), the second emphasizes the activity (verb).

How do I know whether “guru” means the teacher or a teacher? And is it singular or plural?

Indonesian does not have articles like “a” or “the”, and often does not mark plural explicitly.

So “guru” by itself can mean:

the teacher, a teacher, the teachers, or teachers
→ The exact nuance depends on context.

If you need to be explicit:

seorang guru = a teacher (one teacher, non-specific)
guru itu = that/the teacher (specific, “that one”)
para guru / guru-guru = teachers (explicit plural)

In your sentence, “guru” is best read as “the teacher” (the one in that class/situation).

What’s the difference between “membagikan” and “membagi”? Why is “membagikan” used here?

Both come from the root “bagi” (to divide, to share), but:

membagi = to divide something into parts; can also mean “share out,” but focuses more on the thing being divided.
membagikan = to distribute / hand out something to people; focuses more on the recipients.

Form breakdown:

meN- + bagi → membagi
membagi + -kan → membagikan

In context:

Guru membagikan kuesioner singkat…
Emphasizes that the teacher hands out the questionnaires to the students.

You could say “membagi kuesioner”, and people would still understand, but “membagikan” is the more natural verb for “hand out / distribute to people” in this context.

Could I use another verb instead of “membagikan”, like “mendistribusikan”?

Yes, but the nuance changes:

membagikan kuesioner – very natural and common in everyday and semi-formal language; sounds neutral.
mendistribusikan kuesioner – more formal, bureaucratic, or technical (“to distribute questionnaires”). It’s used in reports, research, official writing, etc.

So:

Setelah diskusi, guru mendistribusikan kuesioner singkat…
is grammatically correct, but it sounds more like research-report language than everyday classroom narration.

Why is it “kuesioner singkat” and not “singkat kuesioner”?

In Indonesian, adjectives usually come after the noun they modify.

kuesioner singkat = short questionnaire
- kuesioner (noun)
- singkat (adjective: “short/brief”)

Putting the adjective before the noun (“singkat kuesioner”) is ungrammatical in standard Indonesian. The usual pattern is:

noun + adjective
- buku baru (new book)
- mobil merah (red car)
- guru baik (kind teacher)

What does “kuesioner” mean exactly? Are there other words for this, like “angket”?

Yes:

kuesioner = questionnaire (from English “questionnaire”)
angket = another common word for questionnaire/survey form

In many contexts they are close synonyms:

kuesioner singkat ≈ angket singkat

Nuance:

kuesioner is very common in academic, research, and office settings.
angket is also used, sometimes a bit more in education and government contexts, and in older style textbooks.

In your sentence, “kuesioner singkat” is perfectly natural.

What exactly does “tentang” do here? Could I leave it out and say just “kuesioner perasaan murid di sekolah”?

“tentang” = “about / regarding / concerning”.

kuesioner singkat tentang perasaan murid di sekolah
= a short questionnaire *about the students’ feelings at school*

Without “tentang”, the phrase becomes less clear and less natural:

kuesioner perasaan murid di sekolah
Grammatically possible, but sounds awkward/vague, like “the questionnaire of the feelings of the students at school.”

Using “tentang” is the standard way to express “a questionnaire about X”:

kuesioner tentang kepuasan pelanggan (questionnaire about customer satisfaction)
kuesioner tentang kesehatan mental (questionnaire about mental health)

In “perasaan murid di sekolah”, what does “di sekolah” modify? The feelings, the students, or the whole phrase?

By default, “di sekolah” is understood to describe where the feelings occur:

perasaan murid di sekolah
≈ the students’ feelings at school

So it naturally reads as:

“the feelings the students have when they are at school / about being at school”

Could it modify “murid” (students)? Technically, yes:

students who are at school (as opposed to at home, etc.)

But in realistic context—a teacher handing out a questionnaire in school—the most natural interpretation is “feelings at school / about school life.”

What’s the difference between “murid” and “siswa”?

Both can mean “student / pupil”, but with some nuance:

murid
- Often used for school pupils (especially elementary/junior high).
- Can feel a bit more traditional; also used in religious/teacher–disciple contexts “murid dan guru”.
siswa
- Common for students in primary, junior high, and high school.
- Sounds a bit more official/administrative (used in school documents: data siswa, hak siswa, etc.)

In casual description of a classroom, both are acceptable. In this sentence, using “murid” is natural and clear.

How is tense shown here? How do we know it means “After the discussion, the teacher *distributed…” and not “distributes”*?

Indonesian does not mark tense (past/present/future) on the verb the way English does.

membagikan by itself is tense-neutral: distribute(s)/is distributing/was distributing/will distribute depending on context.

We infer the time from:

The phrase “Setelah diskusi” (After the discussion) → implies a sequence of events.
The typical narrative context: describing something that has already happened.

If you need to be explicitly past, you can add time words:

Setelah diskusi tadi, guru sudah membagikan kuesioner…
(After the earlier discussion, the teacher already distributed the questionnaire…)

But usually, context is enough.

Why is it just “di sekolah” and not “di sekolah mereka” (at their school) or “tentang sekolah” (*about school)?

“di sekolah” = at school / in school
- This is enough to convey the idea of feelings in the school context.
- Indonesian often omits possessives like “their” if it’s obvious: the teacher is asking the students in that school, so “their school” is understood.
“di sekolah mereka”
- Very explicit: at their school (could imply comparing with other schools).
- Correct, just more specific than needed in a normal classroom context.
“tentang sekolah”
- Means about school more generally (maybe the concept of school, the institution, or the school as an object).
- “perasaan murid tentang sekolah” would be “students’ feelings about school”, which is also acceptable, but slightly different nuance from “perasaan murid di sekolah” (feelings in their daily school life).

The original “di sekolah” is natural and idiomatic for “feelings at school / in the school environment.”

Is this sentence considered formal, informal, or neutral Indonesian? Would it be natural in real life?

The sentence is neutral–formal and very natural.

Vocabulary like “diskusi”, “membagikan kuesioner singkat”, “tentang perasaan murid di sekolah” is typical of:
- school settings
- written instructions
- classroom reports or narratives

It’s not slangy, and not overly bureaucratic either. A teacher, textbook, or school report could easily use this exact sentence.

Can I make this sentence passive, like “After the discussion, the short questionnaire was distributed by the teacher”? How would that look in Indonesian, and is it natural?

Yes. A common passive version would be:

Setelah diskusi, kuesioner singkat tentang perasaan murid di sekolah dibagikan (oleh) guru.

Notes:

dibagikan = passive form of membagikan.
oleh (by) is optional here:
- dibagikan guru (very natural)
- dibagikan oleh guru (slightly more explicit/formal)

Both active and passive are natural:

Active: Guru membagikan kuesioner singkat…
Passive: Kuesioner singkat… dibagikan guru.

The active form is a bit more direct and common in everyday storytelling; the passive form is common in reports or when focusing on the object (the questionnaire).