During my elementary years, I remember a book about a group of humans venturing off of Earth to colonize a new planet.
One of the things I specifically remember is how they had the youngest member of the colonization team name the planet. Another thing I remember is how the planet did not have rain, rather having lots of dew in the mornings.
The book ended with who I believe to be the youngest member (who named the planet) telling the story of the colonization to the new generation of children.
Sounds kind of like The Green Book (1981) by Jill Paton Walsh. There is a summary of the plot on the Charlotte's Library blog:
Father, Joe, Sarah, and Pattie, and lots of other families, are leaving a dying earth on one of the last escape ships. They are headed for a far planet that they know almost nothing about, hoping it can sustain human life. Pattie is so young that she will not be able to remember the Earth. But being the youngest, she gets to name the new planet--"Shine," she calls it, a planet where all the plant life sparkles like glass.
How will they build with mineral laden wood they cannot saw? How will they survive, when their rabbits die from eating the glassy grass, and their wheat shines like diamonds? How will they build a community--what will be valued, and why? And then, when they meet other living beings, how will they co-exist?
The child narrator names the planet "Shine".
