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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.
This Week's Word In The News 

PROACTIVE

DEFINITION:
Taking action to control a situation rather than responding to it after it has happened.

FOUND IN THE NEWS:
LoPilato said the policy aims to be proactive, rather than allowing more violence to take place before regulating the problem.
The Los Angeles Times, 07/20/2026

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. Vacillate

To swing indecisively from one course of action or opinion to another.

The food-conducting tissue of vascular plants, consisting of sieve tubes, fibers, parenchyma, and sclereids.

Inspiring awe, admiration, or wonder

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


2. Protagonist

The main character in a drama or other literary work.

Of, relating to, or occurring in the night

The act of reasoning from factual knowledge or evidence.

To honor the memory of with a ceremony


3. Tariff

A schedule of prices or fees.

One who rejects a religion, cause, allegiance, or group for another; a deserter.

The right or privilege of voting; franchise.

A closed plane figure bounded by three or more line segments.


4. Fallacy

Incorrectness of reasoning or belief

Strikingly unconventional and far-fetched in style or appearance; odd

A picture or decorative design made by setting small colored pieces, as of stone or tile, into a surface.

A cult or religious movement, a group sharing particular (often unorthodox) political and/or religious beliefs.


5. Random

Having no specific pattern, purpose, or objective.

Being without or almost without hope

A dense evergreen forest occupying a tropical region with an annual rainfall of at least 100 inches.

A prohibition by a government on certain or all trade with a foreign nation


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