"A very great part of the mischiefs that vex this world arise from words."
Edmund Burke, Letters
Words to Learn This Week
slender
surpass
vast
doubt
capacity
penetrate
pierce
accurate
microscope
grateful
cautious
confident
Read the following story to see how the new words are used in it.
A Valuable Discovery
The laser is a marvelous new device that sends out a slender, concentrated beam of light, a light that surpasses the light at the sun's surface.So vast is the laser beam's power that it has without a doubt the capacity to vaporize any substance located anywhere on earth. The laser can penetrate steel, pierce a diamond, or make an accurate die for wire so thin that it can be seenonly with a microscope.
Grateful eye surgeons report that they have used laser beams to repair the retinas in some fortunate patients by creating tiny scars that joined the retina to the eyeball. Pioneering medical men are making cautious exploration into cancer cures with the laser, confident that they will alter the course of this brutal disease.
Place one of the new words in each of the blanks below.
1. Little Paul was _________ that he got the Christmas present he asked for.
2. I _________ that you can break Michael Jordan's world scoring record.
3. My mother used to say that I was as __________ as a toothpick.
4. Be __________ about swimming right after eating a meal.
5. The map he drew of our neighborhood was not very ________ .
6. In Superman comics, the only thing Superman couldn't _________ was lead.
7. When my family went to look for a new house, we had a _________ choice.
8. Modern highways far ________ the old dirt roads of yesterday.
9. The jar was filled to _________ .
10. We were all very ________ that Duane would pass his exams.
11. The _________ used by my biology teacher is very expensive.
12. The music was so loud that I thought that it would _________ my eardrums.
