NIE | theforum | Words in the News

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. Boycott

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

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

► 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.

2. Guerrilla

► A grotesque ornamental figure or projection.

► To take in by elaborate methods of deceit

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

► A treeless area between the icecap and the tree line of Arctic regions, having a permanently frozen subsoil and supporting low-growing vegetation

3. Tranquility

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

► A person with masterly skill or technique in the arts.

► The quality or state of being tranquil; serenity.

► One who rejects a religion, cause, allegiance, or group for another; a deserter.

4. Quarantine

► The act of resting or the state of being at rest.

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

► Being without or almost without hope

► An intricate structure of interconnecting passages through which it is difficult to find one’s way; a maze.

5. Vaccine

► A preparation of a weakened or killed pathogen.

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

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

► To rejoice greatly; be jubilant or triumphant

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.

ADVERSE

Words in the News Quiz
5 Middle School Words

ADVERSE
DEFINITION: Having a negative or harmful effect on something.	FOUND IN THE NEWS: There was no evidence of “any adverse or harmful chemical or other exposures,” he wrote. ►The Boston Herald, 06/15/2026

ADVERSE

Words in the News Quiz5 Middle School Words

Words in the News Quiz
5 Middle School Words