10/30/2025
Here’s a list of challenging and intriguing words perfect for expanding vocabulary or sparking curiosity in you, your kids, or your students. 👩🏫
✅ 1. Capricious (adjective)
💡Meaning: Tending to change mood or behavior suddenly and unpredictably.
✨Sentence: The weather in the mountains can be capricious, shifting from sunshine to storms within minutes.
✅ 2. Cacophony (noun)
💡Meaning: A loud, harsh, and unpleasant mixture of sounds.
✨Sentence: The city streets were filled with a cacophony of car horns, sirens, and shouting vendors.
✅ 3. Circumspect (adjective)
💡Meaning: Cautious and careful; unwilling to take risks.
✨Sentence: He was circumspect in his business decisions, always analyzing every risk before investing.
✅ 4. Cogent (adjective)
💡Meaning: Clear, logical, and convincing.
✨Sentence: Her cogent argument persuaded even the most skeptical members of the audience.
✅ 5. Conflagration (noun)
💡Meaning: A large and destructive fire.
✨Sentence: The forest conflagration spread rapidly, forcing hundreds of families to evacuate.
✅ 6. Conundrum (noun)
💡Meaning: A confusing or difficult problem or question.
✨Sentence: Deciding which college to attend left her in a conundrum, as each school offered great opportunities.
✅ 7. Cursory (adjective)
💡Meaning: Done quickly with little attention to detail.
✨Sentence: He gave the documents only a cursory glance and missed several important errors.
✅ 8. Credulous (adjective)
💡Meaning: Too ready to believe something; easily fooled.
✨Sentence: The credulous shopper fell for every sales pitch and bought things she didn’t need.
✅ 9. Cathartic (adjective)
💡Meaning: Providing emotional release through expressing strong feelings.
✨Sentence: Writing in her journal each night was a cathartic experience that helped her cope with stress.
✅ 10. Chicanery (noun)
💡Meaning: Use of trickery to achieve a goal.
✨Sentence: The politician was known for using chicanery to win votes rather than honest debate.