Every Thursday night students from St. John’s-Kilmarnock go live on the airwaves reading poetry, story excerpts and event listings. The Poem Repair Shop is a radio show that promotes original literary works written and read by burgeoning young students. Created five years ago by English teacher Adrian Hoad-Reddick as a part of the Writer’s Craft course he teaches, The Poem Repair Shop has had over 250 students pass through the studio of the University of Guelph to promote local literature on the radio.
During the summer months or during March break Hoad-Reddick is in the studio every Thursday at 9 p.m. ensuring the show broadcasts, even when students are not in school. Three times every month, when school is active, a different student co-producer takes over the reins and prepares all the pieces, conducts interviews, researches young writer events, and selects music for the hour long show. Other students arrive to help in the studio, often as a bystander until their confidence and interest grow. Students “learn by osmosis,” says Hoad-Reddick.
Starting in grade nine at The Poem Repair Shop, Jenn Hartley was a regular volunteer on the show for four years. “It developed a new kind of confidence in me. It helped me develop my own creative voice in a unique way,” says Hartley excitedly. Now at Dalhousie University looking to minor in journalism, she learned how to use the studio board and would read literature live on the air.
This creative way to get students passionate about literature and writing is a very inexpensive method. The production studio at CFRU 93.3 is provided free of charge. The radio station also provides the training for Hoad-Reddick and some of the students. In addition the school purchased a high quality audio recorder but audio editing software like Audacity is open-source and free of charge. Other than the time committed to teaching this way, Hoad-Reddick has created “an alternative classroom setting at no cost.”
Shows that have aired are archived on the radio station website, but Hoad-Reddick would like to also distribute the show as a downloadable podcast and have it listed in the iTunes directory. But Hoad-Reddick’s biggest goals are not technical, but to get “enough content so that it is young writers reading their original content.” He is working with and looking for more writer’s craft courses at both private and public schools to increase the amount of writing from younger voices.
This post is part of a series on unique and inspiring teachers. Have a teacher you think deserves being featured? Please email the Our Kids editor, David Field: david [at] ourkids [dot] net.
