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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. No doubt you will be able to ________________ the examination.
  2. I like to ________________ a cookie in coffee.
  3. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  4. Our dog starts to ________________ whenever the doorbell rings.
  5. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  6. He always ________________ the window open while he sleeps.
  7. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  8. The train ________________ at six o'clock.
  9. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  10. Birch trees have smooth white ________________.
  11. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  12. They watched the sun ________________ below the horizon.
  13. What's the difference between broth and ________________?
  14. You can't go backstage without a ________________.
  15. The sergeant loved to ________________ orders at us.
  16. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  17. The supermarket has a large ________________ of merchandise.
  18. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  19. We wanted to take a walk to ________________ the time.
  20. The water is too ________________.
  21. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  22. The ________________ market has crashed.
  23. The ________________ was so hot, it burned my tongue.
  24. The ________________ change colour in autumn.

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

Answer key

  1. pass — to succeed
  2. dip — to dunk
  3. degree — an amount
  4. bark — a dog's sound
  5. kid — to tease
  6. leaves — lets stay
  7. cold — an illness
  8. leaves — to go away
  9. kid — child
  10. bark — of a tree
  11. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  12. dip — to sink
  13. stock — a soup base
  14. pass — a permit
  15. bark — to shout
  16. cold — the Cold War
  17. stock — goods
  18. degree — from a university
  19. pass — to spend time
  20. cold — not warm
  21. degree — temperature
  22. stock — shares
  23. dip — a sauce
  24. leaves — of a tree

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