The YouthMADE Festival is a global celebration of youth creativity and innovation that invites students, educators, and advocates to showcase youth-led work. Leading up to the 2025 YouthMADE Festival, we are sharing a series of stories highlighting youth creators and changemakers around the world who are putting their hands, hearts, and minds toward projects and causes they care about.
This story is by fifth grade students Goldy and Maudy who attend Leap English and Digital, an afterschool program in Surabaya, Indonesia. In this story, Goldy and Maudy share their passion for youth literacy and how they created the Reading Aloud Board Game.
We are twins who are passionate about making reading fun and accessible for children. For the last six years, we’ve studied at Leap English and Digital Class, a center for language study and digital classes known for its vibrant support of student creativity and innovation through its enrichment programs. One of the programs is LeapXperience, which encourages us to explore ideas that can make a positive impact on our peers and community.
When we joined LeapXperience, we were so excited to have literacy as the main theme as this was an issue so close to our hearts. We both love reading and were concerned about childhood literacy. We undertook an exciting learning journey to recognize a real-world challenge, ideate, and develop a solution about literacy.
Our project is the Reading Aloud Board Game, an innovative educational tool that combines reading with physical activity to engage children in a fun and interactive learning experience. We observed that children often think that reading is boring because they have to sit for hours, so we came up with this board game, which combines literacy with physical activity, to promote literacy development in young learners. By integrating reading aloud with physical activities, we aim to foster a love for reading, encourage active lifestyles, and enhance communication skills.
This project is important to us because we believe in the transformative power of education and physical activity in children’s development. We want to make learning enjoyable and accessible, especially in today’s digital age where screen time often replaces physical play and reading.
The project started with learning from experts and field trips to our school library, city library, and reading communities. We conducted observations and in-depth interviews about the state of literacy in our country. Then we brainstormed and discussed how to integrate reading aloud with physical activities. It evolved into developing a prototype of the board game and testing it with children to gather feedback.
Key milestones included designing the game board layout, creating different physical activity cards, and conducting initial testing sessions with children and educators. We actively sought feedback from children and educators through interviews and testing sessions. Their input helped us identify areas for improvement, such as adjusting game rules for clarity and adding more engaging physical activities. We continuously iterate on the project based on this feedback to enhance its effectiveness and appeal.
Two major challenges were resource limitations for materials and accessing diverse books and activities. We addressed this by repurposing existing materials and forming partnerships with local reading communities and organizations.
Students playing the Reading Aloud Board Game
Working on this project has taught us resilience and the power of collaboration. We’ve grown more confident in our abilities to innovate and make a positive impact in our community.
We have gained practical skills in game design, including how to create engaging activities that promote literacy and physical fitness. Researching literacy trends and physical health statistics helped us understand the importance of our project’s objectives.
We have improved our presentation skills as well. At the end of the program, we had an opportunity to present our project in front of our city officials and government representatives— these are important people who run our city. It was the most rewarding experience for us.
Currently, we are learning about project scalability and digital expansion. We’re exploring how to reach a broader audience through technology, such as developing a mobile app or online platform for our game.
Our advice to fellow students is to embrace challenges as opportunities for growth. Be open to feedback and collaboration, as diverse perspectives can lead to more creative solutions. Don’t be afraid to think outside the box and explore digital avenues to expand your project’s reach. Most importantly, believe in the impact of your ideas and persevere through obstacles to make a difference.
When we worked on this project—through observations, research, and interviews—we found out that we weren’t the only ones who faced this challenge. This was one of the reasons why we couldn’t be prouder that our solution to this challenge was handed over to our beloved city Surabaya through Surabaya’s Library and Archive Department. We were immensely happy and proud to make a small contribution to our city.
People can support our project by spreading awareness about the Reading Aloud Board Game, especially to educators and parents who are interested in promoting literacy and physical activity. They can also provide financial support for materials and resources needed to further develop and scale the game, or collaborate with us on partnerships to reach more schools and communities.
In the future, we envision the Reading Aloud Board Game being widely used in schools and homes as a fun and effective tool for enhancing literacy skills and promoting physical health. We hope to develop digital versions of the game to reach a broader audience globally. Ultimately, we aim for the project to inspire a lifelong love for reading and healthy living in children everywhere.
