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Words in the News

This Week's Word In The News 

BACKLOT

DEFINITION:
An area behind or adjoining a movie studio containing permanent exterior buildings for outdoor scenes in filmmaking or television productions.

FOUND IN THE NEWS:
Los Angeles City Councilmember Nithya Raman, who serves the 4th District, makes her way across an empty, unnamed backlot, presenting her case to be the city’s next mayor.
The Los Angeles Times, 05/18/2026

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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. Evanescent

Vanishing or likely to vanish like vapor.

Overbearing pride or presumption; arrogance.

Everyday; commonplace.

To modify, as by shortening or simplifying or by skewing the content in a certain manner.


2. Kowtow

To show servile deference.

To weaken or destroy the strength or vitality of.

A form of government in which the political authority exercises absolute and centralized control over all aspects of life,

A marked change in appearance, character, condition, or function.


3. Loquacious

A marked change in appearance, character, condition, or function.

Warlike in manner or temperament; pugnacious.

Very talkative; garrulous.

A place or situation regarded as drawing into its center all that surrounds it.


4. Nonsectarian

Not limited to or associated with a particular religious denomination.

Of or relating to a holding of something in trust for another.

Of, relating to, or produced by motion.

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


5. Lugubrious

Mournful, dismal, or gloomy, especially to an exaggerated or ludicrous degree.

The use of unnecessarily wordy and indirect language.

A system of names used in an art or science:

Any of numerous natural and synthetic compounds consisting of up to millions of repeated linked units,


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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.