Anne Haas Dyson is a professor at the University of Illinois.College of Education Faculty Profile for Dyson. Her fields are the study of literacy, pedagogy, and contemporary, diverse childhoods. Using qualitative and sociolinguistic research procedures, Dyson examines the use of written language from children's perspectives within their social worlds, and as they engage with popular culture. Books she has published include The Brothers and Sisters Learn to Write, Popular Literacies in Childhood and School Cultures (2003),Dyson, A. H. (2003). The brothers and sisters learn to write: Popular literacies in childhood and school cultures. New York: Teachers: Teachers College Press. Writing Superheroes, Contemporary Childhood, Popular Culture, and Classroom Literacy (1997),Dyson, A. H. (1997). Writing superheroes: Contemporary childhood, popular culture, and classroom literacy. New York: Teachers College Press. Social Worlds of Children Learning to Write in an Urban Primary School (1993),Dyson, A. H. (1993). Social words of children learning to write in an urban primary school. New York: Teachers College Press. Multiple Worlds of Child Writers: Friends Learning to Write (1989).Dyson, A. H. (1989). Multiple worlds of child writers: Friends learning to write. New York: Teachers College Press. Dyson has also written articles for professional journals.
Education Dyson received a Bachelor of Science degree (concentration: English) at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1972. Following this, she obtained a M.Ed., in Curriculum and Instruction (1976) and a Ph.D. in Education (1981) at the University of Texas, Austin.
Statement of Teaching Philosophy
Throughout Dyson's career, Dyson has strived to engage students with their own interests, while helping them develop common skills. In Dyson's words: “As a teacher and a researcher, I think intellectual, political, and moral issues of teaching and learning are best understood—and grappled with—when they are embodied in everyday human experiences of teachers and students, in and out of school; conversely, I think teachers immersed in the very human context of classroom life (which is not neat, not orderly, and not predictable) must also see the larger issues implicit in their daily decisions.”
Continuing, Dyson states, “Finally, my identities as a teacher of the young and not-so-young merge in the kind of engagement I require of my students. Having struggled to help a 6-year-old realize that fish starts with F, not God or water, I do not equate lecturing with teaching. There is nothing lonelier than standing in front of a class when I’m not sure they are, intellectually, with me—and nothing is more satisfying than when we are all making progress together. Then teaching is its own reward.”
Additionally, Dyson stresses the importance of unstructured playtime in preschool and kindergarten as a “fundamental avenue” for learning. Attempts by parents and educators to bombard children with information to give children's cognitive abilities an early boost may be well-intentioned, but is ultimately counterproductive. According to Dyson (2009), “That approach doesn’t appreciate the role of play and imagination in a child’s intellectual development. Play is where children discover ideas, experiences and concepts and think about them and their consequences. This is where literacy and learning really begins.” Although Dyson sees some value in teaching the ABCs to children in pre-kindergarten, she believes that attempting to accelerate learning actually works against a child's development. According to Dyson, kindergarten and preschool should be a place for children to experience play as intellectual inquiry, before they become taken over by the tyranny of high-stakes testing. She states, “I’m certainly not opposed to literacy in the early grades, but the idea that we can eliminate play from the curriculum doesn’t make sense. Kids don’t respond well to sitting still in their desks and listening at that age. They need stimulation. We have to intellectually engage kids. We have to give them a sense of their own agency, their own capacity, and an ability to ask questions and solve problems. So we have to give them more open-ended activities that allow them the space they need to make sense of things.”
Career Beginning in the early seventies, Dyson began teaching and has taught all of her adult life. She began by teaching Mexican American children in a poor Catholic diocese in El Paso, then taught adults in an English Academy, migrant preschoolers, and bilingual first graders in public schools. Presently, Dyson teaches adults, but her teaching sensibilities and goals are deeply rooted in her identify as a teacher of the young.
Dyson began her career in higher education at the University of Georgia, where she was an assistant professor (1981–1985) in the Department of Language Education and belonged to the Graduate Faculty, Graduate School (1984–1985). She began at the University of California, Berkeley in the Division of Language, Literacy and Culture as a visiting assistant professor (1984–1985), then an assistant professor (1985–1987), an associate professor (1987–1991), and became a professor (1991–2002). Dyson then became a professor in the Department of Teacher Education at Michigan State University (2002–2006). Most currently, Dyson is a professor in Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2006–present).
Awards and honors
Research Awards and Honors Dyson received the David H. Russell Award for Distinguished Research in the Teaching of English from the National Council of Teachers of English in 1994 for her book-length ethnographic study, Social Worlds of Children Learning to Write in an Urban Primary School.Dyson, A. H. (1993). Social words of children learning to write in an urban primary school. New Youk: Teachers College Press. The following year, Dyson received the Choice Outstanding Academic Book of the Year (1995), and in 2002 she received the Purves Award from the National Council of Teachers of English as an author of the Research of Teaching English article from the previous year judged as likely to have the greatest impact on educational practice. In 2006, Dyson received the Janet Emig Award for exemplary scholarship from the National Council of Teachers for her article “What Difference does Difference Make? Teacher Perspectives on Diversity, Literacy, and the Urban Primary School” published in ‘’English Education’’ in May, 1995. Again she received the Janet Emig Award in 2006 for the article, “Crafting ‘The Humble Prose of Living’: Rethinking Oral/Written Relations in the Echoes of Spoken Word,” which was published in English Education in 2004. And in 2007, she was selected for the honorable position of “Scholar” by the Hofstra University.
Teaching Award Dyson received the Distinguished Teaching Award from the University of California-Berkeley in 1998.
Dyson's Research
Dissertation Dyson's dissertation entitled, “A Case Study Examination of the Role of Oral Language in the Writing Processes of Kindergarteners” helped to set the stage for her future research of children's writing in a sociocultural context.Dyson, A. H. (1981). A case study examination of the role of oral language in the writing processes of kindergartener (Doctoral dissertation, University of Texas, 1981). Dissertation Abstracts International, 47, 2001. In her dissertation, Dyson drew heavily from scholars such as Britton,Britton, J. (1970). The student’s writing. In E. Evertts (Ed.) ‘’Explorations in children.’’ Urbana: NCTE. Vygotsky,Vygotsky, L.S. (1978). ‘’Mind in society, the development of higher psychological processes.’’ Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Ferreiro, and others who emphasized the critical role that oral language has in literacy learning. For instance, Britton was quoted by Dyson as stating: “All that the children write, your response to what they write, their response to each other, all this takes place afloat upon a sea of talk. Talk is what provides the links between you and them and what they have written, between what they have written and each other.” In her dissertation,Dyson, A. H. (1981). ‘’A case study examination of the role of oral language in the writing processes of kindergarteners’’ (Doctoral dissertation, University of Texas, 1981). Dissertation Abstracts International, 47, 2001. Dyson elected qualitative research to investigate the role of oral language in the early writing processes of five kindergarten students over a three-month period. During her case study she collected data, such as observational notes, audio recordings of children's talk, written products, daily log entries, child and parent interviews, and informal assessment tasks. At the conclusion of this study, some of Dyson's findings include: that talk is an integral part of the early writing process, young children write for different purposes, and that there is no one early writing process.
Research Focus Anne Haas Dyson's research focuses on the study of early childhood literacies from a sociocultural perspective. Known mainly by her works, Dyson immerses herself in ethnographic research that examines children's writing, in particular story making. Common threads found throughout Dyson's work include her study of primary grade children in urban schools with culturally diverse populations over the course of a year or more. In Dyson's words, “My research focuses on language and literacy development in the early childhood years. I use qualitative and sociolinguistic research procedures to examine written language use from children’s points of view - from within their own social lives” Additionally, Dyson studies the influences of popular culture on young children's literacy development. She comments, “My projects include an interest in written language as part of children’s symbolic repertoire (e.g., talk, drawing, dramatic movement) and in the intersection of childhood cultures and school literacy learning. What matters most to school children is often other children. Written language can become woven into their unofficial childhood practices in ways that co-exist with, contribute to, or conflict with the official school world. Young children’s literacy use often entails their participation in popular culture. So I have become interested in changing notions of written language and of the texts through which people learn and play (particularly those of popular culture), in how children’s literacy use reflects these changing notions, and in how schools should respond to those changes”
Methodology