Teens learn how to repair

Repairing broken stuff is a mindset that has been lost over time. Fixing something that is broken used to be the logical reaction in a household. Children required fixing skills from their parents who then taught it to their children as well. Somewhere in time this evident mindset and transfer of basic repair skills got lost. Young people these days seldomly encounter the “art” of repairing. Potentially easily repairable products in households are just being replaced, giving kids (our future generation) no chance to acquire even the most basic repair skills. If we want the up-and-coming generation to think differently about their products, it’s important that we focus on different ways to bring minors in contact with the art of repairing again.

Repair4Teens 

Repair Café Roeselare, together with Vives (college of applied sciences), decided to join forces and work out a hands-on workshop for teens to get them excited about repair again.

The workshop consisted of five stops where the teenagers learned about repairs in different product categories together with volunteers from the repair café. During each stop a specific product with a particular defect was shown on a table. The different stops the children encountered focused on:

• Bike repair
• Computer repair
• Electronics repair x 2
• Wood repair

In a very pragmatic way, the kids explored the skills and mindset needed to start repairing. “How would you open this product? How do you think this works? What parts do you notice? What could be the issue here?” The children were challenged by the repair volunteers by explorative questions and repair knowledge was acquired in a practical way.

The evaluation from the participants (7 kids between 12 & 14 years old) and the repair volunteers were both very positive. It was a first pilot in the design of a recurrent offer to children and schools to get into contact with repair skills again.