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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. Today is the ________________ day of the holidays. Back to school tomorrow!
  2. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  3. You can't play pool without a ________________ stick.
  4. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  5. I'd like to play a game of ________________.
  6. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  7. At ________________, we arrived at the village.
  8. The president vowed to ________________ the mutiny.
  9. He was locked up in a ________________.
  10. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  11. Cut the butternut ________________ into one-inch cubes.
  12. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  13. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  14. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  15. I'll take my ________________ from you.
  16. When I cough twice, that's your ________________ to come into the room.
  17. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  18. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.
  19. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  20. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.
  21. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  22. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  23. False peace will not ________________.
  24. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!

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

Answer key

  1. last — final
  2. degree — from a university
  3. cue — for pool
  4. clip — for paper
  5. squash — the sport
  6. degree — temperature
  7. last — finally
  8. squash — to crush
  9. cell — in a prison
  10. tear — from crying
  11. squash — the vegetable
  12. shower — rain
  13. cell — in biology
  14. shower — to wash
  15. cue — a hint
  16. cue — a signal
  17. clip — a video
  18. tear — to rip
  19. clip — to cut
  20. shower — a meteor shower
  21. degree — an amount
  22. tear — from crying
  23. last — to go on
  24. cell — a phone

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