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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. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  2. Have you found your soul ________________?
  3. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  4. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  5. She's very handy with a ________________.
  6. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  7. That was a fun ________________.
  8. The little girl was crying for the teddy ________________.
  9. He works in a ________________ mill.
  10. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  11. We ________________ that the plan would end in failure.
  12. Don't ________________ out at me just because you're upset.
  13. He felt the sting of the whip's ________________.
  14. Males and females first ________________ when two years old.
  15. Many happy returns to all who ________________ the name of a flower!
  16. The water is too ________________.
  17. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  18. The spa offers ________________ extensions.
  19. A black ________________ roamed the forest.
  20. Excuse me, sorry ________________, you haven't got the time have you?
  21. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  22. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  23. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  24. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.

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

Answer key

  1. cold — the Cold War
  2. mate — a partner
  3. clip — for paper
  4. game — a kind of play
  5. saw — the tool
  6. degree — an amount
  7. game — a match
  8. bear — the animal
  9. saw — the tool
  10. clip — a video
  11. saw — past of 'see'
  12. lash — to lash out
  13. lash — a whip stroke
  14. mate — to breed
  15. bear — to put up with
  16. cold — not warm
  17. degree — temperature
  18. lash — an eyelash
  19. bear — the animal
  20. mate — a friend
  21. game — wild animals
  22. clip — to cut
  23. degree — from a university
  24. cold — an illness

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