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. Inference
► An embankment built to prevent flooding
► The act of reasoning from factual knowledge or evidence.
► Something that is passed down from preceding generations; a tradition.
2. Aspire
► Something that is passed down from preceding generations; a tradition.
► Being without or almost without hope
► An unstable, poisonous allotrope of oxygen.
► To have a great ambition or ultimate goal
3. Protagonist
► Conversation between characters in a drama or narrative
► The main character in a drama or other literary work.
► A weather phenomenon in the Eastern Pacific that is precisely equivalent to a hurricane.
4. Omnivore
► One who habitually takes advantage of the generosity of others without making any useful return.
► One that takes in everything available, as with the mind.
5. Vacillate
► To swing indecisively from one course of action or opinion to another.
► A schedule of prices or fees.
► A closed plane figure bounded by three or more line segments.
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.