Words in the News

This Week's Word In The News 

CANVASS

DEFINITION:
A systematic approach to interviewing residents, merchants, and others who are in the immediate vicinity of a crime and may have useful information.

FOUND IN THE NEWS:
In a press release, police said Lewisville Fire Department officials pronounced the man deceased on the scene. Police started a homicide investigation immediately, and canvassed the area in search of witnesses.
►The Denton Record-Chronicle, 09/14/2026

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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. Wrought

► Put together; created.

► The side of a right triangle opposite the right angle.

► Clear to the understanding.

► Vanishing or likely to vanish like vapor.

2. Laissez faire

► Noninterference in the affairs of others.

► A circular strand of DNA in bacteria that contains the hereditary information necessary for cell life.

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

► Everyday; commonplace.

3. Temblor

► Everyday; commonplace.

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

► Shaking and vibration at the surface of the earth resulting from underground movement along a fault plane.

► The process in green plants and certain other organisms by which carbohydrates are synthesized from carbon dioxide and water using light as an energy source.

4. Mitosis

► Falling off or shed at a specific season or stage of growth:

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

► Having a harmful effect; injurious.

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

5. Ziggurat

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

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

► 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.

► Eating and drinking in moderation.

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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.