Grade 9-10: Vocabulary Lesson for Wednesday, Week 5

Word List 5

1. truism: a self-evident truth
2. veracity: adherence to the truth; truthfulness; conformity to fact or truth; something that is true
3. literate: able to read and write; knowledgeable or educated in a particular field; a well-informed, educated person
4. nondescript: lacking distinctive qualities; having no individual character or form
5. obliterate: to do away with completely so as to leave no trace; to wipe out, rub off, or erase
6. ravenous: extremely hungry; voracious; greedy for gratification
7. swagger: to walk or conduct oneself with an insolent or arrogant air; strut; to brag; boast

Wednesday Activities

1. Go to this link to learn how to make a mind map in excel. Step by step directions guide you in completing this task. After you create your mind map in excel, make a mind map using your vocabulary words. Print this and put it inside your vocabulary notebook.
2. Use this site, Bubbl.us,to create mind maps online. The directions for using this tool are on the right side of the page. Print out your creation and insert it in your vocabulary notebook.
3. Create a mind map with words that mean the opposite or antonyms. Use the thesaurus built into your word program to find more words that are antonyms. Or you can go to this on-line thesaurus

Other Help

If you need more information on your words, click on the link to use a on-line dictionary.

Use the daily activities to help you remember words that you learn each week. It is much easier to remember what the words mean if you do something with them and use them frequently in talking with your parents, family and friends.

Sample sentences:

The Golden Rule represents a truism that is often ignored.
One of the most important truisms underpinning our society is that all men are created equal.

The lawyer for the defense tried his best to undermine the veracity of my testimony.
Judge Hollis was such an honorable man that no one ever doubted his veracity.

Few residents of the poor country were literate so newspapers weren't very helpful in getting out the warning.
Unlike last year's teacher, my literature teacher this year is extremely literate and well-read.

Undercover police officers often prefer to drive nondescript vehicles.
To hide his wealth, the millionaire lived in a nondescript house in a poor part of town.

Beating an opponent wasn't enough, the sadistic warrior wanted to obliterate them.
The crazed dictator tried to obliterate a race of people because they were different from him.

After floating in a life raft for five days the surviving sailors were ravenous.
The vet told me to put my dog on a diet and the poor thing was ravenous.

I watched the school bully swagger as he stalked down the hall.
There was a definite swagger to the world champion team as they walked to their team bus.

 
 

For more vocabulary, reading and other language arts resources, please visit our interactive skillbuilders.