Shining Dawn Books

Who doesn’t love a nature walk around a pond? All ages are drawn to ponds for nature study. Maybe it’s the peacefulness of the still water, or maybe it’s the quiet hum of busyness from all the life in and around the pond.

This unit gives you tons of ideas to use when visiting ponds. You’ll observe around the water’s edge, peer across the surface of the water and even find out what’s in the water. You can choose to complete one of the notebooking pages, draw maps, count insects, measure water depths, collect and compare plants and much, much more.

Back at home, you might choose to observe pond water under a microscope and identify microscopic creatures, or complete a cross-section mural of a pond. You might make a pond food chain or write a story about one of the critters you observed on your nature walk. You’ll have just as much fun inside as out!

Ponds make great places for studying all sorts of nature topics.  Peaceful Ponds will help you thoroughly cover plant, animal and insect life in and around ponds, as well as learn about various pond types and their impact in our world.  You won’t want to skip this unit with all the exciting activity ideas and 15 notebooking pages!

Scroll down to view a sample.

62 pages, e-book

“They have TONS of ideas of things to do during a pond study – I counted almost 100 ideas between things to do ‘in the pond’, ‘around the pond’, ‘hands-on activities’, and ‘writing and research ideas’!  They also give recommendations on books to read while doing a pond study, Bible lessons that tie into ponds, and even poetry, artists and picture studies, and composers and music references…all that tie into ponds.” ~Dana, School For Us

$8.95

The NaturExplorers unit studies are electronic books (e-books).  Immediately upon checkout, you will receive an email containing your PDF download. Please check your junk mail folder if the download doesn’t arrive in your inbox. You may email Cindy at naturexplorers@gmail.com with any questions regarding your purchase.

Links to art, artists, composers, compositions, poetry and literature suggestions:

Artist and Picture Study

Claude Monet – The Water Lily Pond, Pond at Montgeron

John Constable – Branch Hill Pond, Hampstead; The Lower Pond, Hampstead

Paul Cezanne – Couples Relaxing by a Pond

Henri Rousseau – Ice Skaters on Frozen Pond

Theodore Rousseau – Pond at the Edge of a Wood

Pierre Auguste Renoir – Pond at Fees

Frank Weston Benson – Lily Pond

Composer and Music Study – Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Swan Lake (history)

Swan Lake (listen to snippets)

Poetry -

The Old Pond by Matsuo Basho

Fishes Evening Song by Dahlov Ipcar

When Daddy Fell Into the Pond by Alfred Noyes

Recommended Books and Such

Peaceful Ponds



These are links to specific titles that we have suggested where we ask you to do your own internet search because of copyright.  We’re hoping this will be an acceptable compromise!  There are often other books we have suggested to go along with the art, composer or poetry suggestions.  They are already included in the “recommended book” section, so we chose not to link them again.

As always, if you come across a great link or additional idea for any of these areas, please let us know and we’ll add it right away!
Peaceful Ponds Sample Pages