Orbiting Jupiter: Chapters 7–9

by Gary D. Schmidt
When twelve-year-old Maine farmboy Jackson Hurd meets his new foster brother, another middle schooler whom others see as trouble, he learns what it means to have someone's back.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: Chapters 1–3, Chapters 4–6, Chapters 7–9
20 words 639 learners

Learn words with Flashcards and other activities

Definition First
Print Flashcards

Other learning activities

Answer a few questions about each word. Use this to prep for your next quiz! Compete with other teams in real time to see who answers the most questions correctly! Test your spelling acumen. Read the definition, listen to the word and try spelling it!

Teaching tools

Create and assign quizzes to your students to test their vocabulary. Assign learning activities including Practice, Vocabulary Jams and Spelling Bees to your students, and monitor their progress in real-time.

Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. gust
    a strong current of air
    The snow came down with hard gusts, socking the sides of the pickup and blotting out the windshield.
  2. skillet
    a pan used for frying foods
    “I thought,” my mother said, “I was going to take this skillet to his face.”
  3. pacifist
    someone opposed to violence as a means of settling disputes
    My mother, I should tell you, is a pacifist.
  4. protest
    express opposition through action or words
    She got arrested three times during college for protesting foreign policy in El Salvador. She got arrested five times for protesting against nuclear power.
  5. confident
    having or marked by assurance
    Mrs. Stroud said everyone was confident he’d be found soon.
  6. toll
    ring slowly
    A church bell tolling once, the sound hard as iron in the cold air.
  7. instinct
    inborn pattern of behavior often responsive to stimuli
    I’m going to ignore my instincts here and take you with me.
  8. interfere
    get involved, so as to alter or hinder an action
    I had to not interfere.
    I had to not expect to see Jupiter.
    I really had to not interfere.
  9. slaughter
    kill, usually for food consumption
    When we got out and my mother saw Joseph, she ran toward him. He probably wasn’t sure if she was going to hug him or slaughter him.
  10. determined
    characterized by great firmness of purpose
    “You look so much alike,” she said. “And determined, like she is.”
  11. truant
    absent without permission
    And over the next couple of days, Mr. Canton had a lot to say to Joseph about missing school and about responsibilities and being truant and meeting expectations, and who did he think he was, and didn’t he get it that rules are for everybody and stuff.
  12. nominate
    propose as a candidate for some honor
    He wasn’t doing fifth-period Office Duty anymore, since Mr. D’Ulney had nominated him for Math Olympiad in April, so fifth period he was tutoring Joseph in trigonometry.
  13. sap
    a watery fluid that circulates in a plant
    The nights stayed cold, and the days warmed, and the sap flowed like it had never flowed before, and my father almost laughed at the number of pails we brought in, and brought in, and brought in every day.
  14. arrangement
    something agreed to
    “You sold her! You freaking sold her!”
    “I made an arrangement,” Joseph’s father said. “You weren’t going to get her. And we needed a new truck. I’m not a do-good fool—like them."
  15. insurance
    protection against future loss
    “How’d you like that? I’ll take my kid and yours for insurance.”
  16. nudge
    push against gently
    He put his hand on my back and nudged me toward my father.
  17. girder
    a beam used as a main support in a structure
    The rotted timbers collapsed and the pickup fell between the girders and then it went through the ice and was gone.
  18. chapel
    a place of worship that has its own altar
    We met in a side chapel of new First Congregational, because there were so few of us.
  19. waddle
    walk unsteadily
    As soon as the door was opened and Mrs. Stroud got her unstrapped, Jupiter was out and sort of waddling around, looking at everything, touching everything, smelling everything, as if she had a whole lot of time to make up for and she wasn’t going to waste a second.
  20. graze
    feed as in a meadow or pasture
    We went into the Big Barn and I showed her the cows—she was a little afraid, but she’d be okay—and then out to the Near Field where Quintus Sertorius was grazing and looking like he didn’t want to do anything else, but he perked his velvet ears when he heard Jupiter squeal.
Created on Thu Oct 13 15:07:32 EDT 2016 (updated Wed Aug 09 12:10:09 EDT 2023)

Sign up now (it’s free!)

Whether you’re a teacher or a learner, Vocabulary.com can put you or your class on the path to systematic vocabulary improvement.