Hearing Poems

A child’s first experience with poetry is almost never with the eyes. Children hear poems before they ever see them. Gina Clark, a poet and teacher, believes poetry was meant to be heard – not read. Today, Clark visits with Rachel on Worlds Awaiting, about the plusses of reading aloud to our children. It helps them as they’re beginning to read, speak, and explore language. Gina will also reads some of her own poems in the course of the interview.    Gina Clark is a Utah native and mother of six children - ages 5 to 15. She completed a Master of Fine Arts degree in poetry at Arizona State University and has taught as an adjunct at Brigham Young University and Utah Valley University. She’s currently a writing instructor with BYU's Independent Study. It should go without saying that Gina is an avid supporter of her local public library (Orem, Utah), where she’s been a volunteer storyteller for over a decade. Her monthly Storytime presentations might better be called Poetrytime, since she packs in plenty of poems!