This was my question last week and now I am despairing because I don’t have enough time left this year to get my teeth into any more of the many ideas I have discovered. I would like to begin to list ones that I have tried which have been successful.

Popcorn Reading: Give a copy of the story to each student. In pairs, they make a double circle. For a given time limit (1 minute worked well for middle primary) the student in the inside circle would read aloud the first sentence to their partner who would then translate it. They continue on doing this until time is called. The outside circle then moves one person to the right and in the time it takes for me to reset the timer, the new pair should be working out where they each got up to and then be ready to start again from the sentence that was closest to the beginning of the story. This continues until you as the teacher feel that enough repetitions have been completed.

Word Chunk Game– Divide the class into small groups and have each group choose an Indonesian name for themselves and a gesture which will become their war cry. Write the group names up on the board. Read out a sentence from their story (or sentences similar to their story but tweaked slightly eg the who/what/where) and as a group they have to translate the sentence. When they are sure that everyone in their group can translate the sentence, they all put up their hands. The group that did this first, must then do their war cry. If any members do not participate in the war cry, then move to the next group. This is important because it helps develop group solidarity. It is also lots of fun! Then it is up to the teacher to choose one group member to give the translation who can not be assisted in any way by anyone else. If the translation is correct, the team gets a point and then they can boost their points with each group member having a bonus ball toss from a free throw line into a bin (I used my paper recycling bin).

Running Dictation– Divide the students into teams. Put copies of the story out the front. Students take it in turns to run out to the front of the room to read and memorise a sentence which they then run back to their team and tell their team, one of whom will write it down.

Class Books – make the stories into class books and create a class library. Students from other classes will also enjoy reading the stories.