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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. Will civil ________________ and democracy continue in Algeria?
  2. The water is too ________________.
  3. Flower arranging is a traditional ________________ in Japan.
  4. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  5. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  6. I was having a ________________ recording these guys.
  7. Remember our ________________: no talking to strangers, no matter what.
  8. The King held a masked ________________.
  9. He spent years learning his ________________ as a carpenter.
  10. The chairman did not ________________ out the possibility of a disagreement.
  11. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  12. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  13. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  14. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  15. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.
  16. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  17. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  18. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  19. The kitten curled into a ________________.
  20. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  21. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  22. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  23. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  24. Small ________________ should stay in the harbor during the storm.

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

Answer key

  1. rule — government
  2. cold — not warm
  3. craft — a handicraft
  4. content — the amount
  5. content — happy
  6. ball — a great time
  7. rule — a law
  8. ball — a dance
  9. craft — a skill
  10. rule — to rule out
  11. content — videos and posts
  12. file — a document
  13. bat — for baseball
  14. cold — an illness
  15. shower — a meteor shower
  16. file — a line of people
  17. file — a tool
  18. bat — the animal
  19. ball — a round shape
  20. bat — in an idiom
  21. shower — rain
  22. cold — the Cold War
  23. shower — to wash
  24. craft — boats

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