Words in the News

This Week's Word In The News 

ACQUAINTANCE

DEFINITION:
A person one knows slightly, but who is not a close friend.

FOUND IN THE NEWS:
When photographer Peter Turnley was just 20 years old, an acquaintance from the California Office of Economic Opportunity reached out to him with a question.
►The Los Angeles Times, 12/01/2025

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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. Despondent

► 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.

► Having no specific pattern, purpose, or objective.

► Being without or almost without hope

► A preparation of a weakened or killed pathogen.

2. Unanimous

► Sharing the same opinions or views; being in complete harmony or accord.

► Using or marked by the use of few words; terse or concise.

► To stress or emphasize; intensify

► Any of various nonplacental mammals, including kangaroos, opossums, bandicoots, and wombats, found principally in Australia and the Americas.

3. Maneuver

► Any of various nonplacental mammals, including kangaroos, opossums, bandicoots, and wombats, found principally in Australia and the Americas.

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

► A movement or procedure involving skill and dexterity.

► One thing conceived as representing another; a symbol.

4. Sect

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

► The systematic procedure by which a complex or scientific task is accomplished.

► An ammunition belt, worn over the shoulder, having loops or pockets for cartridges.

► A Y-shaped protein on the surface of B cells that is secreted into the blood or lymph in response to an antigenic stimulus

5. Ozone

► An unstable, poisonous allotrope of oxygen.

► A dense evergreen forest occupying a tropical region with an annual rainfall of at least 100 inches.

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

► The arrangement of events in time

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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.