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. Fatuous

► Vacuously, smugly, and unconsciously foolish.

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

► To picture falsely; misrepresent.

► To impress (something) upon the mind of another by frequent instruction or repetition; instill.

2. Nonsectarian

► A doctrine holding that all values are baseless and that nothing can be known or communicated.

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

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

► Deception by trickery or sophistry.

3. Detritus

► Playfully jocular; humorous

► Noninterference in the affairs of others.

► A product of disintegration, destruction, or wearing away; debris.

► Of or relating to money

4. Loquacious

► Very talkative; garrulous.

► A plane curve formed by the intersection of a right circular cone and a plane parallel to an element of the cone.

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

► To divide (a geographic area) into voting districts so as to give unfair advantage to one party in elections.

5. Quasar

► To divide (a geographic area) into voting districts so as to give unfair advantage to one party in elections.

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

► An extremely distant, and thus old, celestial object whose power output is several thousand times that of our entire galaxy.

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

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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.