Media Moments

October 2026

Bring your classes!

The media center offers many versatile spaces and a comfortable atmosphere for teaching lessons. Sometimes a change of venue will breathe new life into a lesson or provide the right amount of space to spread students into work stations. You can take advantage of our main floor, which offers more than 40 tables. The Instructional Space accommodates an entire class and has a computer, projector, speakers, and dry-erase walls. The media center also offers group-study rooms for smaller clusters of students. Please reach out if you would like to reserve a space in the media center for your classes. We would love to accommodate you and will help you with whatever resources you need.

Let's collaborate!

From Mr. Robitaille

I am keen to join forces with you to share resources and plan projects. I love to teach lessons about media literacy, research, and book selection. I also love to integrate our resources into creative projects. If you would like to investigate virtual reality options, video projects, Makerspace integration, or anything else multimedia, please reach out so we can plan something amazing. If your students are doing any kind of research, I would love to show them how to best take advantage of our databases and organizational tools. Please hunt me down! I'd love to work with you!

Grab a spooky book this October! 🎃

The media center is decked out for Halloween and is ready to loan students some spooky books. Thanks to the amazing decorating talents of Dr. Griffiths, visitors to the media center will be greeted by a display of spooky October reads (after dodging bats and spiders!). Our horror section has been expanded this year to include even more titles. Send your students or stop by yourself to grab something spooky to read this month!

Access reviews on Common Sense Media

Common Sense Media is a non-profit organization that provides age-based ratings, reviews, and recommendations for movies, TV shows, games, books, and apps to help parents choose appropriate content for children. I frequently use Common Sense Media to gauge age recommendations for books and other media. They offer expert reviews and parent reviews, with lots of categories and feedback. The media center has a subscription to Common Sense Media. If you would like to access their reviews, please contact Mr. Robitaille to sign in.

Fall Sora reading challenge

Students are encouraged to join the Fall Reading Challenge on our e-reader platform, Sora. From now until the end of November, students can visit Sora and register for the reading challenge. The platform then keeps track of how many minutes the students read ebooks, magazines, and audiobooks. The students who spend the most amount of time on Sora will win prizes, including a gift basket and Starbucks gift cards. Please encourage your students to register. Information can be found on school announcements and in the media center.

Convert files easily online

If you ever need to convert a file from one format to another, try using this free online file converter from iHateFiles.com. This browser-based file converter can easily convert your weird image formats (webp, heic, etc.) into more user-friendly formats, such as jpeg. It also converts video formats and audio formats. Their tools page includes options for compressing images, resizing images, rotating/flipping images, removing image backgrounds, and more.

Visit https://ihatefiles.com to start converting.

Reading Buddies form friendships at Ellsworth Hill

Reading Buddies is a new collaborative program designed by Andrew Robitaille and Ellsworth Hill media specialist, Angie Jameson. HHS student volunteers visit Ellsworth Hill Elementary School once every month to collectively read a book to Mrs. Cribari's first-grade class. They then break into groups to read additional books and do craft activities. Reading Buddies launched on September 16 in the Denise Lukingbeal Outdoor Learning Pavilion behind Ellsworth Hill Elementary School. The high school students immediately bonded with their first-grade buddies and had a wonderful time sharing stories and building friendships. The next Reading Buddies program will occur on October 14.

The September Reading Buddies event was featured on the Hudson Connects Weekly broadcast on Sept. 18, 2026.

Checking your library account

Teachers are able to check their library account to see what items they are currently borrowing. Here's how:

Click on the iSearch icon on the main library website.
Select My Account in the top-right corner.
For the User ID, type your 7-digit employee ID number.
For the PIN, type your birthday in MMDD format. (Use four digits. Eg., April 9 is 0409.)
Select the Checkouts tab to see your current loans.