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Words in the News

This Week's Word In The News 

OVERZEALOUS

DEFINITION:
Showing too much energy or enthusiasm in pursuit of a cause or objective.

FOUND IN THE NEWS:
Patrolmen’s Association, the city’s largest police union, attributed the encounter to an “overzealous poll worker who was complaining to the officer that the councilor shouldn’t have even been inside.”
The Boston Herald, 11/17/2025

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Words in the News Quiz
5 Middle School Words

Click on the correct answer in the quiz below.
Then see if you can find the word in your newspaper -- the print edition, the website or the digital edition and copy the sentence for context. NOTE: High School words are much harder to find!


1. Deign

An alteration or change, as in nature, form, or quality.

Of or relating to the range of invisible radiation wavelengths from about 4 nanometers, on the border of the x-ray region, to about 380 nanometers, just beyond the violet in the visible spectrum.

To condescend to give or grant

Self-examination.


2. Decorum

A conventional, formulaic, and oversimplified conception, opinion, or image.

Appropriateness of behavior or conduct

A diffuse mass of interstellar dust or gas or both, visible as luminous patches or areas of darkness

Any of several rod-shaped bacteria, of the genus Salmonella, that cause food poisoning and other diseases.


3. Inference

The act of reasoning from factual knowledge or evidence.

The practice of professing beliefs, feelings, or virtues that one does not hold or possess; falseness.

Conversation between characters in a drama or narrative

The right or privilege of voting; franchise.


4. Silhouette

A drawing consisting of the outline of something, especially a human profile, filled in with a solid color.

The branch of biology that deals with animals and animal life, including the study of the structure, physiology, development, and classification of animals.

An ammunition belt, worn over the shoulder, having loops or pockets for cartridges.

Any of various nonplacental mammals, including kangaroos, opossums, bandicoots, and wombats, found principally in Australia and the Americas.


5. Voracious

Consuming or eager to consume great amounts of food; ravenous.

A characteristic rate or rhythm of activity; a pace

Relating to a system of writing, such as that of ancient Egypt, in which pictorial symbols are used to represent meaning or sounds or a combination of meaning and sound.

One that speaks for, represents, or advocates


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Common Core State Standard
LS.CCS.4/5/6 Grades 3-12: Students are asked to determine the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning words through multiple choice vocabulary quizzes. Quizzes are designed to help students demonstrate understanding of figurative language, word relationships and nuances in words, acquire and use accurately grade-appropriate general academic and domain-specific words, and gather vocabulary knowledge when considering a word or phrase important to comprehension or expression. Students are then asked to find the words within the newspaper and copy the sentence for context to its overall meaning or function in a sentence.