I have been reading Environmental Education: principles and practice, published by Edward Arnold in 1978, and edited by Sean McBirney Carson. Odd, you might think, given its venerable 33 years ageing on my bookshelves, but I delved into it for background to aid a chapter on the links between environmental education and ESD that Paul Vare and I are drafting.
Carson wrote the brief Introduction and was editor. It's a shame, however, that he didn't contribute more to the book itself, given his insightful views and trenchant style. A final Overview would have been of interest and use, letting the reader know what he made of the 14 (inevitably uneven) chapters which followed.
Here is a taste of his style:
"The 'Keele conference on Education and the Countryside' as it was called, brought together for the first time representatives of the various academic disciplines concerned with the landscape, agriculture, forestry, and nature conservation. Most of the debate, as I well remember, consisted of inter-disciplinary argument, much to the amazement of the organizers who came from planning and conservancy departments of government and not from education. However, this was inevitable, and from it came the first report using the title Environmental Education. Report No. 9 to the second 'Countryside in 1970' Conference of October 1970 ... was written, unfortunately, in a style that has so often plagued educational documents, suggesting as wide-spread general trends what (sic) were really tiny movements maintained by a small number of concerned activists. It uses phrases like 'A vast increase' to describe what were minimal advances; 'More and more local authorities are appointing advisory officers concerned with ... environmental education', when they could have been numbered on two hands; and of course the Department of Education and Science claimed to have been encouraging environmental education all along — while taking care to absolve itself from any obligation to give any leadership in the future."
Still missed.
The paperback cost £6.95. In 1978 that must have seemed expensive.
Responses
I worked for many years with Sean. And remember this conference well. Aldi was very closely involved in production of an a level environmental education syllabus. Alas at that time came to no avail .