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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. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  2. The ball is in your ________________.
  3. Birch trees have smooth white ________________.
  4. Our dog starts to ________________ whenever the doorbell rings.
  5. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  6. Sooner or later you'll have to ________________ the truth.
  7. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  8. The birds use the scarecrow as a ________________.
  9. She's very handy with a ________________.
  10. He works in a ________________ mill.
  11. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  12. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  13. That was a fun ________________.
  14. Our bedroom windows ________________ the sea.
  15. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  16. The owl hooted softly from its ________________.
  17. The water is too ________________.
  18. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  19. The sergeant loved to ________________ orders at us.
  20. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  21. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.
  22. ________________ is common in the lakes of Sweden.
  23. We ________________ that the plan would end in failure.
  24. She had a strange look on her ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. tear — from crying
  2. court — for sport
  3. bark — of a tree
  4. bark — a dog's sound
  5. cold — the Cold War
  6. face — to confront
  7. game — a kind of play
  8. perch — for a bird
  9. saw — the tool
  10. saw — the tool
  11. court — of law
  12. court — of a king
  13. game — a match
  14. face — to point toward
  15. game — wild animals
  16. perch — for a bird
  17. cold — not warm
  18. cold — an illness
  19. bark — to shout
  20. tear — from crying
  21. tear — to rip
  22. perch — the fish
  23. saw — past of 'see'
  24. face — part of the head

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