YALSA's Teens' Top Ten

The Teens' Top Ten is a "teen choice" list, where teens nominate and choose their favorite books of the previous year! Nominators are members of teen book groups in sixteen school and public libraries around the country. Nominations are posted on Celebrate Teen Literature Day, the Thursday of National Library Week, and teens across the country vote on their favorite titles each year.

The Official 2014 Teens' Top Ten titles have been announced! Watch the video or refer to the list below. The Media Center has copies of the bolded books on the list- stop in and check one out!

Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell 

Splintered by A.G. Howard 

The Rithmatist by Brandon Sanderson 

The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey

Monument 14: Sky on Fire by Emmy Laybourne 

Earth Girl by Janet Edwards 

The Testing by Joelle Charbonneau 

Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson

Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo

The Eye of Minds by James Dashner

A New Way to Search for Materials

The Media Center has a new catalog to search for materials in the library! You can access this on any device from any location with internet access.

Within the next few weeks, all students and staff with receive login information to access your account to renew items, see your circulation history, or place holds on items. If you don't receive information and want to start accessing your account, stop by the media center and I will provide you with the necessary information.

The new system allows us to borrow from other libraries within a network of public, special, and school libraries. This means if we don't own a book that you want to read, we can order it for you and it will arrive within a week!

Visit the following link to search our collection: http://wbmiddlehigh.masscat.org/

As always, stop by the media center if you need help or have questions.

Middle School Summer Reading

Can't find your list? Follow this link to the school website to find all the lists and instructions on how to complete your work.

If you have a strong opinion about one of the books and want to write a review, submit it to our WB Reads! page for others to read!

May Newsletter

Follow this link to read the newsletter for May. Catch up on new technology, summer programs, and more!

Scholastic Book Fair

West Boylston Middle High School will host a Scholastic Summer Reading Book Fair Monday, May 19 through Friday, May 23 to help raise funds for purchasing new books for the Media Center. The Book Fair will be open Monday through Friday from 7:00am - 3:00pm, as well as evening hours on Thursday, May 22 until 7:00pm.  

The Book Fair will feature a wide range of books for pre-teens, teens, and adults, including mystery and adventure novels, fantasy series, sports guides, graphic novels, and the latest bestsellers from more than 100 publishers. 

Parents, children, teachers, and the community are invited to attend. Visit the homepage to check hours, see previews of available books, and shop online (from May 12 - June 1 only). 

Celebrate Your Media Center!

April 13-19, 2014 marks National Library Week. All types of libraries- school, academic, public, special- take this week to celebrate the contributions of our nation's libraries and librarians and to promote library use and support. 

The Media Center offers many of the amenities you would expect, such as research help, a computer lab, and a robust selection of fiction and non-fiction, but we also offer other amenities you might not know about!

Do you read e-books or listen to audiobooks? Use your C/W MARS card or sign up for a BPL e-card to access e-resources for free on your tablet, phone, or e-reader. The Media Center website also lists many other resources where e-resources can be obtained for free!

Want to keep up to date on current events and local news? We carry a variety of periodicals, including Time, The Week, Sports Illustrated, Teen Ink, Popular Science, and more, as well as The Banner. 

Working on a project and need mobile technology? You can borrow a Chromebook for up to two hours- see Mrs. Klemm to check one out. While you're here, pick up your wifi password for use throughout the building.

Looking for a book to read, but not quite sure what you're looking for? Check out the frequently changing displays throughout the Media Center or ask Mrs. Klemm for a recommendation.

Interested in new technology or working with electronics? Stop by the Makerspace to test drive a Raspberry Pi computers or build a Lego Technic model. 

National Poetry Month

April is National Poetry Month!

Inaugurated by the Academy of American Poets in 1996, National Poetry Month is now held every April, when schools, publishers, libraries, booksellers, and poets throughout the United States band together to celebrate poetry and its vital place in American culture.

There are poems posted around the school by a variety of poets on many different topics. Take a minute to stop and read some of the poems- you might discover one that you really love! I've posted my personal favorite just outside the Media Center door- let me know what you think.

The Media Center has a large poetry section covering an array of emotions- happy, sad, funny, melancholy, love, despair, and more. Come in and discover the world of poetry!

Visit The Academy of American Poets website for more information about poets and their works.

Play Ball!

Jimmie Foxx at bat at Fenway Park

To celebrate the official start to spring, a display of photos and books related to the Boston Red Sox, the All‑American Girls Professional Baseball League, and baseball in general is available for viewing in the windows of the Media Center.

Boston’s baseball history began in 1871 with the formation of the Boston Red Stockings (also known as the Americans and the Braves along the way). Though the Braves left Boston, first for Milwaukee and later for Atlanta, the Red Sox have stayed true to their local roots, remaining an enormously popular Boston fixture and giving birth to the Red Sox Nation. 

Babe Ruth in the dugout with Joe Cronin
and his manager, Bill McKechnie

The Boston Public Library has collected a wide variety of baseball-related memorabilia. While much of this collection contains print materials and must be seen in person, many images and memorabilia have been made available digitally in the past few years. A selection of photos have been displayed in the Media Center. Want to see more? Visit the BPL's collection of images. 

March is Women's History Month

During the month of March, the Library of Congress, National Archives and Records Administration, National Endowment for the Humanities, National Gallery of Art, National Park Service, Smithsonian Institution and United States Holocaust Memorial Museum join in paying tribute to the generations of women whose commitment to nature and the planet have proved invaluable to society. 

Stop in to the Media Center to view our display or visit Women's History Month to read about, listen to, and view photos of these extraordinary women. 

1924 Olympics

First American Olympic hockey team

The first ever wintertime Olympics took place in 1924 from January 25 – February 5, in Chamonix, France. This article from the 1922 Washington Times lists some of the events for the winter games, as well as for the 1924 summer Olympics. Are they the same sports that are offered today? Take a deeper look by researching the sports that have been included throughout the history of the winter Olympics and think about why particular sports might have been added or removed.

Check out the display in the windows of the Media Center to find materials about the 2014 Olympic games, along with games of the past. Be sure to check out the constantly updated medal count to see how the United States is performing!

Magnetic Poetry

Visitors to the Media Center have been having fun making their own original poetry with our magnetic words. Stop by and see what you can come up with!

Get ready for exams!

Prep for your exams and start the next semester on the right foot with tips from How to Study!

Tech Spotlight

Tech Spotlight    Get the Math is about algebra in the real world. See how professionals use math in music, fashion, videogames, restaurants, basketball, and special effects. Take on interactive challenges related to those careers. Smithsonian's History Explorer was developed by the National Museum of American History in partnership with the Verizon Foundation to offer hundreds of free, innovative online resources for teaching and learning American history. With NOVA Elements, explore an interactive periodic table, play a game hosted by David Pogue, or watch the two-hour NOVA program, “Hunting the Elements.”

New Book Displays

Graphic novels and anime (fiction and nonfiction)!

Lots of new fiction and nonfiction!

Biographies on a variety of important folks!

MSLA Bookmark Contest

Every year, the Massachusetts School Library Association (MSLA) sponsors a bookmark contest based around a specific theme for students in grades K-12. This year’s theme is School Libraries: Something for Everyone. Students are encouraged to design a bookmark based on this theme- think about the things besides books that our media center offers! WBMHS will choose three winners in each division (Div. 3: grades 4-6 and Div. 4: grades 7-12) from our school to enter into the statewide contest. Entries will be considered by a team of judges. The winners and honorable mentions in each division will be awarded prizes at the State House in March 31, 2014. See Mrs. Klemm or Miss Zell for entry forms or click here. Entries must be submitted by January 31, 2014.