Student art hits online museum
Cowansville — Students at Sugarcreek and Chicora Elementary schools in the Karns City School District are graduating from glue sticks to galleries thanks to an online art museum added to the curriculum this year.
Art teacher for both schools Lindsay Green said she introduced Artsonia, an online, global children's art museum, to her elementary students in the fall.
“It's just a really nice electronic portfolio for kids,” Green said.
Based in Illinois and launched in 2000, Artsonia is a website created by art educators and parents to showcase student artwork from around the world. According to the website, Artsonia features more than 16 million art projects from 120 countries.
Green said she first started using Artsonia because it provides educators with access to lesson plans from classrooms across the globe. Once familiar with the site, she said she decided to take advantage of its gallery and fundraising components.
“People can post comments about artworks, and they can also become fan club members of certain artists, so the kids get a kick out of it,” Green said.
As her students complete art projects in the classroom, Green uploads photos of the art to the website using the Artsonia app on her phone.
She creates an exhibit — for example, Green said her first-graders just completed an exhibit of Egyptian-themed self portraits — and gives it a title and description. She then uploads student art to the exhibit, tagging each student's individual projects.
“If you click on one student, you can see all of her artworks that she's done so far,” Green said. “Those will stay on here from kindergarten through sixth grade.”
In addition to giving her students a sense of pride in their work, Green said Artsonia also provides opportunities for classroom fundraising.
Artsonia allows family and friends of student artists to customize and buy prints of artworks on items such as mugs, T-shirts, jewelry and even phone cases.Green said 20 percent of all sales go to the school. As of May 1, Green's students had raised $370 toward purchasing a classroom iPad.“Next year I hope to have an iPad in each classroom,” Green said. “Then when they're finished with an artwork in class, they can grab the iPad, they can snap their picture and upload it right to their account.”The iPad will help Green keep up with the massive amount of art her 800 students produce.She said she spends time each evening uploading art and had more than 500 completed artworks left to tag at the beginning of May.Green's students said they are also excited about having an iPad in the classroom and sharing their work with the world.“I think it's really cool because you can see everyone's artwork and it gives you ideas,” said Emma Kusick, a first-grader at Sugarcreek.Sugarcreek fifth-grader Brayden Stuchell said he enjoys seeing art from students across the country and knowing that they're looking at his work.“I really like that because I live in a very small neighborhood, and it seems like I just like sharing things with people, especially my art,” Stuchell said. “And I don't mean to brag, but I think I'm pretty good at it, too.”Students aren't required to participate on Artsonia and not all of her students have permission from their parents to use the site, Green said.“They definitely have the right to deny it,” Green said. “There are no last names posted on the website. I had some parents (who) were just kind of concerned about safety, but they were going to check it out this year and maybe sign up next year.”Karns City Superintendent Eric Ritzert said he's been receiving positive feedback about Artsonia from parents and school board members. As a parent himself, he said the website has his family's approval.“I have children at the Chicora building and, from the standpoint of a parent, my children love it because it gives them a format to display their art, and they get a kick out of being able to show us as parents how to sign in and see it,” Ritzert said.Both Ritzert and Green said they would like to see Artsonia expand to other schools in the district.
