Rachel Carson, Wonder and Environmental Education

Abstract Rachel Carson (1907-1964) became famous for her book “Silent Spring”, published in 1962. This book explained how the use of herbicides and pesticides like DDT in the northern hemisphere was causing a build-up of DDT in the flesh of penguins in the Antarctic, and that governments and corporations everywhere should exercise restraint in their use of technology to avoid unintended impacts on the world’s ecological systems. When she wrote this book, Carson had terminal cancer, and decided to go ahead and complete this crucial book, rather than to write a book on the wonder of the natural world and how to instil a sense of it in children. But in 1965 she did publish a short book, “The Sense of Wonder”, which includes as a chapter her earlier essay ‘Help your child to wonder’, about revealing to a child the mysteries to be found at the edge of the sea. So Rachel Carson’s contribution to environmental protection, in addition to her works about marine ecology and her disclosure of the dangers of herbicides and pesticides, included also her practice and advocacy of environmental education. This perspective is still relevant today.