Words in the News

This Week's Word In The News 

PENDULUM

DEFINITION:
A weight suspended from a pivot so that it can swing freely.

FOUND IN THE NEWS:
The grim forecast was driven by lower than projected state revenues, continuing a pendulum swing from the fiscal boom of the COVID-19 pandemic.
►The Los Angeles Times, 05/13/2024

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Words in the News Quiz
5 Middle 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. Quota

► A schedule of prices or fees.

► A proportional part or share.

► A diffuse mass of interstellar dust or gas or both, visible as luminous patches or areas of darkness

► To have a great ambition or ultimate goal

2. Malignant

► To have a great ambition or ultimate goal

► Selecting or employing individual elements from a variety of sources, systems, or styles

► A very large and destructive wave, generally caused by a tremendous disturbance in the ocean, such as an undersea earthquake or volcanic eruption.

► Harmful, malevolent, injurious. Harmfully cancerous.

3. Quarantine

► A closed plane figure bounded by three or more line segments.

► The main character in a drama or other literary work.

► A grotesque ornamental figure or projection.

► Enforced isolation or restriction of free movement imposed to prevent the spread of contagious disease.

4. Sect

► Relating to a system of writing, such as that of ancient Egypt, in which pictorial symbols are used to represent meaning or sounds or a combination of meaning and sound.

► A prohibition by a government on certain or all trade with a foreign nation

► A cult or religious movement, a group sharing particular (often unorthodox) political and/or religious beliefs.

► The repetition of the same sounds or of the same kinds of sounds at the beginning of words or in stressed syllables

5. Quandary

► A state of uncertainty or perplexity.

► Loud, noisy, and lacking in restraint or discipline

► The act of reasoning from factual knowledge or evidence.

► Consuming or eager to consume great amounts of food; ravenous.

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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.