Words in the News

This Week's Word In The News 

ADVERSE

DEFINITION:
Having a negative or harmful effect on something.

FOUND IN THE NEWS:
There was no evidence of “any adverse or harmful chemical or other exposures,” he wrote.
The Boston Herald, 06/15/2026

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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. Playfully jocular; humorous

Laissez faire

Gerrymander

Facetious

Lucid


2. The iron-containing respiratory pigment in red blood cells of vertebrates.

Hemoglobin

Ziggurat

Nihilism

Nadir


3. Very talkative; garrulous.

Loquacious

Churlish

Expurgate

Nonsectarian


4. A factor that determines a range of variations; a boundary

Nonsectarian

Fiduciary

Parameter

Xenophobe


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

Bellicose

Usurp

Deleterious

Lugubrious


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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.