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Multiple-Meaning Words

A multiple-meaning word is spelled and said the same way but means different things: a bat flies at night, and you hit a ball with a bat. Context is the only clue, which is why these words are such good reading practice.

Here are 124 multiple-meaning words from past ClueBy puzzles, each with a real example sentence for every meaning. Use them as a reference, or make a printable worksheet below.

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Students read each sentence and write the missing word. Every word appears in several sentences, each time with a different meaning.

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Multiple-Meaning Words

Name: ____________________Date: __________

Write the missing word in each sentence. Each word is used more than once, with a different meaning each time.

  1. Later, his shop becomes a ________________ with young dancers.
  2. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  3. Is the royal ________________ prepared for the journey?
  4. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  5. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  6. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  7. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  8. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  9. The ________________ told me I needed to practice harder.
  10. The water is too ________________.
  11. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  12. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  13. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  14. Have you met the new head ________________?
  15. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  16. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  17. I belonged to the harmonica ________________ in my high school days.
  18. My rich neighbors belong to a private golf ________________.

Sentences from ClueBy, Tatoeba (CC BY 2.0 FR) and Common Voice (CC0). clueby.com

Answer key

  1. club — for dancing
  2. degree — temperature
  3. coach — pulled by horses
  4. degree — from a university
  5. cold — the Cold War
  6. field — a subject
  7. clip — for paper
  8. field — farmland
  9. coach — a trainer
  10. cold — not warm
  11. field — for sport
  12. clip — a video
  13. cold — an illness
  14. coach — a trainer
  15. degree — an amount
  16. clip — to cut
  17. club — a group
  18. club — for golf

Multiple-meaning words list

Tick up to 10 words to build a worksheet with just those words.

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Frequently asked questions

What are multiple-meaning words?

Words with the same spelling and pronunciation but more than one meaning, like bark (of a dog or of a tree) or bank (for money or of a river). You can only tell which meaning is meant from the rest of the sentence.

Are multiple-meaning words the same as homonyms?

Mostly, yes. Teachers often use "multiple-meaning words" and "homonyms" for the same idea. Homophones are different: they sound alike but are spelled differently, like flour and flower.

Are the worksheets free?

Yes. Make and print as many as you like for home or classroom use. Each sheet has its own link, so you can print the same one again.

Where do the words come from?

From past ClueBy puzzles, a daily game where you sort twelve sentences by their missing word. A new puzzle every day adds four more words to this list.

Sentences from ClueBy, Tatoeba (CC BY 2.0 FR) and Common Voice (CC0). clueby.com