Words in the News

This Week's Word In The News 

SUREFIRE

DEFINITION:
Certain or likely, especially to succeed.

FOUND IN THE NEWS:
Kirby taught himself how to count cards, a surefire way to get barred from gambling at a casino, “raking in money on trips to Atlantic City and Las Vegas,” the article stated.
►The Las Vegas Review-Journal, 05/04/2026

Generate your own quiz
Select a grade level
 Elementary
 Middle School
 High School
Select a quiz type
 By words
 By Definitions
Select how many questions
5   10   15   20  

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. Malignant

► Harmful, malevolent, injurious. Harmfully cancerous.

► The practice of professing beliefs, feelings, or virtues that one does not hold or possess; falseness.

► To have a great ambition or ultimate goal

► Similarity in some respects between things that are otherwise dissimilar.

2. Jaunty

► Similarity in some respects between things that are otherwise dissimilar.

► Marked by hearty conviviality and good cheer.

► Having a buoyant or self-confident air; brisk.

► To grow well or luxuriantly; thrive

3. Ultraviolet

► Having a backbone or spinal column.

► To abstain from or act together in abstaining from using, buying, or dealing with as an expression of protest or disfavor or as a means of coercion

► Of or relating to the range of invisible radiation wavelengths from about 4 nanometers, on the border of the x-ray region, to about 380 nanometers, just beyond the violet in the visible spectrum.

► A conventional, formulaic, and oversimplified conception, opinion, or image.

4. Heritage

► A metric unit of length equal to 1,000 meters (0.62 mile).

► A disorderly commotion or disturbance.

► The act of reasoning from factual knowledge or evidence.

► Something that is passed down from preceding generations; a tradition.

5. Participle

► A rebirth or revival.

► To condescend to give or grant

► A form of a verb that in some languages, such as English, can function independently as an adjective.

► Incorrectness of reasoning or belief

Get more Quizzes 

 Elementary School    Middle School   High School  

 By Word     By Definition    5  10  15  20 Questions

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.