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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 116 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. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  2. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  3. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  4. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  5. Our bank has a ________________ near the station.
  6. The water is too ________________.
  7. He chopped down the ________________ with an ax.
  8. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  9. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  10. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  11. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  12. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  13. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  14. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  15. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  16. Biology is a ________________ of science.
  17. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  18. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.

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

Answer key

  1. prune — to trim
  2. field — a subject
  3. hand — part of the body
  4. hand — help
  5. branch — of a bank
  6. cold — not warm
  7. branch — of a tree
  8. prune — the fruit
  9. content — happy
  10. hand — in cards
  11. cold — an illness
  12. field — farmland
  13. content — videos and posts
  14. cold — the Cold War
  15. field — for sport
  16. branch — a division
  17. content — the amount
  18. prune — to trim

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