STUDENTS AT WATERTOWN’S ST. STEPHEN’S ARMENIAN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL LEARN ABOUT GARDNER ART HEIST
Watertown TAB & Press
682938725/Students-at-Watertown-s-St-Stephen-s-Arm enian-Elementary-School-learn-about-Gardner-art-he ist
Nov 25 2009
MA
Photo: St. Stephen’s Armenian Elementary School grade five students
with Stephen Kurkjian, FBI Special Agent Geoffrey Kelly, Julia Kramer
and Principal Houry Boyamian.
WATERTOWN — .There’s been a great deal of excitement in fifth-grade
teacher Julia Kramer’s classroom at St. Stephen’s Armenian Elementary
School in Watertown. It started with fifth-grade parent Rosalyn
Minassian volunteering to do the weekly current events discussion with
the class. Following her art passion, she decided to teach about the
unsolved heist at the Gardner Museum in 1990.
To cater to different intelligences and interests, the students
used their computer class to listen to the news report while seeing
the various artwork stolen from the museum. They wrote down their
observations and questions in their detective book. After a lively
discussion about the stolen artwork with Minassian, the students
then had an opportunity to speak to two investigators of the case,
retired Boston Globe journalist Stephen Kurkjian and FBI Special
Agent Geoffrey Kelly.
The students’ excitement and quest for knowledge was evident through
the hands waiving eagerly in the air. The Gardner Museum’s director
of security, Anthony Amore, has even invited the fifth-grade class
for a VIP tour of the museum.
"It’s wonderful to see the children so eagerly go in depth on a
topic as we provide them with a breadth of opportunities to learn —
from computers to art to forensic science to newspaper reporting,"
said Houry Boyamian, principal of the school.
— St. Stephen’s Armenian Elementary School