Sun Tiles Cemented onto Sundial

After weeks of rain, the sun is shining and the sundial is operational! WooHoo! The words of instructions, along with the numbers and the months have been affixed to the cement slab. If the sun shines, the sundial tells time. The brilliant sun that is a large part of the mosaic design is also set in morter on the sundial. Visitors and volunteers are welcome to come and visit and try their hand at creating a part of a mosaic. (Friday May 27-Sunday May 29, 9am-3pm) It's starting to look beautiful within the chaos. Kind of like how we parents feel about kids growing up.

Volunteers Needed!

I'm looking for volunteers to work on the Mosaic Sundial during May.

Here's some opportunities:
Monday-Thursday, any time between 9 and 3, work indoors on arranging tiles. This is kind of like doing a puzzle without any rules. Come for an hour and try your hand at it, or show up every day. The set-up is in the hall near the preschool.

Sunday May 15, during Parent Work Day, we will be setting tiles in thinset morter on the sundial itself. Come join me for an hour or all day. I hope to film some of this action. Keep your fingers crossed for good weather.

Robyn

Annalemna

What the heck is an analemna? Is that the name of a new BCSIS kindergartener? Just kidding.

The lopsided figure 8 that you see at the bottom of the sundial, in the black non-shadowed area, is called an Analemna. It is a representation of the path of the sun throughout the year.

If you could record the position of the sun in the sky at the same time every day, you would notice that the sun takes a rather strange path. You might notice that at certain times throughout the year the sun's position not only varies higher and lower (North and South) as you would expect with the change of the seasons, but also slightly east and west. This figure-8 path that the sun makes in the sky is called the analemma. In the movie "Castaway", Tom Hank's character marks an analemna on the wall of his cave, and uses it to calculate the bast time to attempt an escape from the island.
For more information, and in-depth explanation, and some mathematical fun, see http://www.analemma.com/Pages/framesPage.html