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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 

MITIGATION

DEFINITION:
The action of reducing the severity, seriousness, or painfulness of something.

FOUND IN THE NEWS:
But after years of record investment by the state in such wildfire risk mitigation, two key money sources are drying up, potentially reducing the state’s annual budget for vegetation removal by hundreds of millions of dollars.
The Los Angeles Times, 06/01/2026

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. Aspire

Using or marked by the use of few words; terse or concise.

Conversation between characters in a drama or narrative

To have a great ambition or ultimate goal

Having a backbone or spinal column.


2. Decorum

In a deplorable state of distress or misfortune; miserable.

To move back or away from a limit, point, or mark

Loud, noisy, and lacking in restraint or discipline

Appropriateness of behavior or conduct


3. Alliteration

The repetition of the same sounds or of the same kinds of sounds at the beginning of words or in stressed syllables

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

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

The science and art of using all the forces of a nation to execute approved plans as effectively as possible during peace or war.


4. Labyrinth

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

The science and art of using all the forces of a nation to execute approved plans as effectively as possible during peace or war.

The locus of points for which the sum of the distances from each point to two fixed points is equal

An intricate structure of interconnecting passages through which it is difficult to find one’s way; a maze.


5. Jovial

Sharing the same opinions or views; being in complete harmony or accord.

Marked by hearty conviviality and good cheer.

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.

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


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