Good morning, everyone. Did you have a chance to research the Niagara Falls? Did you come across the photo showing people walking on the Falls? This was due to partial freezing of the waterfalls due to ice jams. This happened a few times in history, the last time in 2019, the winter when I visited my daughter in Canada. We went to Niagara Falls to see the ice floating down the river. The warmest temperature during our holiday was -21C. This is colder than your ice box.
Did you read about people going down the Falls in a barrel? Or did you see the photo of the man walking across on a tightrope? That’s so scary!
The reason for us not seeing as much water rushing down the waterfall as Frederic Edwin Church did when he painted his picture ‘Niagara Falls’ in the 1860s is that engineers have built a hydro power station since. Some of the water is channelled away to create electricity.
Do you remember where you can see the painting of ‘Niagara Falls’? Correct! It is located at the Scottish National Gallery. We can’t go there today. The galleries are in lockdown, too, but you can go online to nationalgalleries.org and find out more about the picture.
Yesterday’s task was to find a picture of the Scottish National Gallery and create a line drawing of it with pen. Did you manage to do it without using a pencil first? I must admit that it was tricky. I used a pencil for the even spacing of the columns. Then I went over it with pen. The problem is that there will be traces of erased pencil.
Do not worry if your drawing is just a set of scribbles.
P3-4: How many different shapes can you spot?
P5-7: What does this building look like? Have you seen similar buildings before? In which country would you expect to find buildings like this?
The Scottish National Gallery was designed by William Henry Playfair, a famous architect. It was completed in 1856. How many years ago is that?
It was built in a neoclassical style. This means that it looks very grand. It has simple geometric forms. There are lots of columns. The columns used for the Scottish National Gallery are ionic columns. Their capital, that is the term for the top of the column, looks like a scroll or a snail’s house.
Our STEM experts may want to find out more about neoclassical and classical architecture. Why are mathematics and engineering important for architecture?
If you have any spare time, look up the technical terms in the above picture.
Today’s task is very simple.
You will need paper from the recycling bin, scissors, glue.
You are going to make a collage of a dog being walked on the pavement in front of the Scottish National Gallery. P4B made some fabulous dogs and dog-walkers for their display of the Royal Mile. It was outside the office and all of you will have walked past it.
Your dog can look as simple as this – or really fancy. Don’t forget the collar!
Enjoy! Dr Stahl
Ferryhill Primary School 