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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. The flowers bloom in the ________________.
  2. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  3. I put the bag on or beside the ________________.
  4. The hotel is built around a mineral ________________.
  5. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  6. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  7. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  8. The water is too ________________.
  9. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  10. There's a broken ________________ in the bed.
  11. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  12. James Baker serves as an Honorary Co-________________ for the World Justice Project.
  13. Professor Sir Peter Hirsch formerly held the ________________.
  14. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  15. He always ________________ the window open while he sleeps.
  16. The train ________________ at six o'clock.
  17. The ________________ change colour in autumn.
  18. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.

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

Answer key

  1. spring — the season
  2. degree — an amount
  3. chair — to sit on
  4. spring — of water
  5. wound — an injury
  6. wound — an injury
  7. wound — past of 'wind'
  8. cold — not warm
  9. degree — from a university
  10. spring — a coil
  11. cold — the Cold War
  12. chair — a leader
  13. chair — a professorship
  14. cold — an illness
  15. leaves — lets stay
  16. leaves — to go away
  17. leaves — of a tree
  18. degree — temperature

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