The Brothers and Sisters Learn to Write

Building on her groundbreaking work in "Writing Superheroes, Anne Dyson traces the influence of a wide-ranging set of "textual toys" from children's lives--church and hip-hop songs, rap music, movies, TV, traditional jump-rope rhymes, the words of professional sports announcers and radio deejays--upon school learning and writing. Wonderfully rich portraits of five African American first-graders demonstrate how children's imaginative use of wider cultural symbols enriches their school learning.

Anne Haas Dyson is a professor in the literacy program of the College of Education at Michigan State University.