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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 like lots of butter on my ________________ in the morning.
  2. I would like to propose a ________________ on your birthday.
  3. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  4. The kitchen ________________ is next to the microwave.
  5. Take your time. There's no ________________.
  6. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  7. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  8. The ________________ market has crashed.
  9. That must've been a ________________.
  10. It's one o'clock ________________.
  11. The water is too ________________.
  12. Nobody expected a disaster on this ________________.
  13. He's quite ________________, isn't he?
  14. You shouldn't ________________ things.
  15. After the show, she was the ________________ of the town.
  16. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  17. Every pianist practices the C major ________________.
  18. The supermarket has a large ________________ of merchandise.
  19. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  20. This knife is not ________________ enough.
  21. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  22. What's the difference between broth and ________________?
  23. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  24. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. toast — bread
  2. toast — a drink to someone
  3. cold — the Cold War
  4. scale — for weighing
  5. rush — hurry
  6. file — a tool
  7. field — for sport
  8. stock — shares
  9. rush — a thrill
  10. sharp — exactly
  11. cold — not warm
  12. scale — size or range
  13. sharp — clever
  14. rush — to hurry
  15. toast — the most admired
  16. cold — an illness
  17. scale — in music
  18. stock — goods
  19. field — farmland
  20. sharp — with an edge
  21. field — a subject
  22. stock — a soup base
  23. file — a document
  24. file — a line of people

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