“Brothers and Sisters” Blog: Noah’s Literacy Arc

“The Brothers and Sisters Learn to Write” by Anne Haas Dyson is a fascinating ethnography.  Although our book club decided to break up the reading into sections, I found myself wanting to learn even more about the elementary school classroom that Dyson studied for the book.  The dynamics of the children’s relationship with each other and literacy were all framed, in my understanding, by the texts we have read and conversations we have shared in our own class this semester.

This particular text opened my eyes to some entirely new aspects of literacy, especially in the context of children’s literacy, and the various contemporary mediums that influence their development .  The section of the book I payed particular attention to focused on one of the boys, Noah.  Although Dyson attempts to convey a sense of objectivity, and typically succeeds in this endeavor by using scientifically exacting diction throughout, her affection for the students is clear.

Noah seems like the type of youngster it would be impossible not to like.  She uses Noah as a means of chronicling the short term of development of written literacy.  Although Noah, like all children, is unique in his progress toward writing intelligibly, he provides an interesting case study of children’s understanding and implementation of symbols at an age when these practices are first being expected of children in school.

Noah was especially fascinating (probably why Dyson chose to focus on him for this chapter) because his written stories manifested themselves as intricate hybrids of art and written language.  Dyson’s analysis of his stories revealed a multitude of valuable insights into a child’s conception of literacy as a means of creating a personal universe with symbols on paper.  Dyson shows how improved literacy over time impacts the stories, particularly the cohesiveness of events within the story.

The purpose of Dyson’s book is ethnographic awareness of a specific academic setting, specifically a kindergarten class in the Bay Area, CA.  Dyson successfully shines a light on arguably the most important and interesting stage in literacy development by examining children at the source, and analyzing the factors that contribute to their development, paying particular attention to the various contributors outside the classroom.

Because our group divided the book into a few chapters for each of us to read, most of conversations revolved around filling each other in on what the we had read.  It was interesting to here about the other children Dyson studied, and see the parallels between her research of each student.  Although the focus of each chapter was different, all of them seemed to hit on similar notions of literacy and how it is heavily influenced by the culture outside the classroom.

We talked a lot about our own experiences with literacy at the age of the class Dyson studied, and how we related to most of Dyson’s analysis.