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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

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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. Analogy

Having no specific pattern, purpose, or objective.

A poisonous substance, especially a protein, that is produced by living cells or organisms.

A disorderly commotion or disturbance.

Similarity in some respects between things that are otherwise dissimilar.


2. Hypocrisy

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

A weather phenomenon in the Eastern Pacific that is precisely equivalent to a hurricane.

To condescend to give or grant

An unstable, poisonous allotrope of oxygen.


3. Sacrifice

An unstable, poisonous allotrope of oxygen.

Having or demonstrating enthusiasm

Forfeiture of something highly valued for the sake of one considered to have a greater value or claim.

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


4. Mosaic

Having a backbone or spinal column.

A picture or decorative design made by setting small colored pieces, as of stone or tile, into a surface.

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

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


5. Nuisance

A preparation of a weakened or killed pathogen.

A member of an irregular, usually indigenous military or paramilitary unit operating in small bands in occupied territory to harass and undermine the enemy

One that is inconvenient, annoying, or vexatious; a bother.

To pound, crush, or grind to a powder or dust.


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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.