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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. Place the flour, butter and salt into a large clean ________________.
  2. He chopped down the ________________ with an ax.
  3. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  4. He's the lead singer in a rock ________________.
  5. Our bank has a ________________ near the station.
  6. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  7. It's your turn to ________________ the ball down the lane.
  8. Biology is a ________________ of science.
  9. The water is too ________________.
  10. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  11. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  12. He still wears his gold wedding ________________.
  13. Millions watch the Super ________________ every February.
  14. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  15. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.
  16. He put a rubber ________________ around the bundle of letters.
  17. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  18. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. bowl — a dish
  2. branch — of a tree
  3. file — a line of people
  4. band — a music group
  5. branch — of a bank
  6. cold — an illness
  7. bowl — to roll
  8. branch — a division
  9. cold — not warm
  10. cold — the Cold War
  11. tear — from crying
  12. band — a ring
  13. bowl — a football final
  14. tear — from crying
  15. tear — to rip
  16. band — a rubber band
  17. file — a document
  18. file — a tool

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