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Words in the News

This Week's Word In The News 

SUREFIRE

DEFINITION:
Certain or likely, especially to succeed.

FOUND IN THE NEWS:
Kirby taught himself how to count cards, a surefire way to get barred from gambling at a casino, “raking in money on trips to Atlantic City and Las Vegas,” the article stated.
►The Las Vegas Review-Journal, 05/04/2026

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Words in the News Quiz
5 High 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. Nonsectarian

► Playfully jocular; humorous

► Government by a few, especially by a small faction of persons or families.

► An underlying base or foundation especially for an organization or system.

► Not limited to or associated with a particular religious denomination.

2. Bellicose

► A dramatic or literary form of discourse in which a character talks to himself or herself or reveals his or her thoughts without addressing a listener.

► Warlike in manner or temperament; pugnacious.

► Of, relating to, or produced by motion.

► The use of words to express something different from and often opposite to their literal meaning.

3. Mitosis

► To repeat in concise form. To make a summary.

► The process in cell division by which the nucleus divides.

► Either of two points on the celestial sphere at which the ecliptic intersects the celestial equator.

► To increase the positive charge or valence of (an element) by removing electrons.

4. Ziggurat

► Cheerfully confident; optimistic.

► A temple tower of the ancient Assyrians and Babylonians, having the form of a terraced pyramid of successively receding stories.

► A person unduly fearful or contemptuous of that which is foreign, especially of strangers or foreign peoples.

► The use of unnecessarily wordy and indirect language.

5. Interpolate

► The use of unnecessarily wordy and indirect language.

► Vanishing or likely to vanish like vapor.

► The act or process of inhaling and exhaling; breathing.

► To insert or introduce between other elements or parts.

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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.