Spring Pond and Tree Study

Spring time means revisiting our chosen tree and pond for our seasonal studies. We went to Clifton Park where there is a big conker tree we're looking at, and their pond in the gardens up near the cafe.

We've been doing this since before we started our 'official' home ed studies and check out our chosen places each season to look for the signs and changes. Check out previous post for our autumn and winter results for this set.

We started with a picnic under the tree and Bear was really good at being able to explain how we knew it was spring just by looking at the tree. We discussed the blossom and how it preceded the conkers, and he talked about the really bright green leaves.

The boys took their magnifying glasses to look at the blossom, which we decided looked a lot like tissue paper close up, and they tried to measure how far it was around the trunk, which was bigger than their two measuring tapes put together...

Bear took some photos and The Cub had a close-up look at the bark with his handheld microscope. 

Then we moved on to the pond where we had a new gadget to use. I'd bought them a thermometer attached to a rubber duck so they could find out the temperature of the water. They both thought this was great and the water showed 14°c which wasn't bad bearing in mind it was frozen over last time we were there! 

Bear caught some litter and removed it and then spent ages making ripples with a little pipette, trying to see how far he could get them across the water.

We will be making journal pages for both and recording the data we took this time, and then after we've done our summer study too, we go back and look at the four different stages to see the changes side by side.

Last year, we did the tree study on a Sycamore tree near our house, but this is the first pond we've done, so we will possibly also compare the two trees to see their differences in each season.

I've found this to be a lovely way of teaching the boys about how the seasons affect the world around them, and because they are both naturally so inquisitive, they are forever asking questions off the back of what I tell them, meaning that they are forever learning new facts.

Do you do a nature study of any kind?

I'd love to hear about it and what you get up to.

Mama Bear x