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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 116 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. The elephant has a huge ________________.
  2. He was blown up by a land ________________.
  3. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  4. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  5. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  6. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  7. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  8. I've got the luggage in my ________________.
  9. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  10. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  11. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  12. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  13. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.
  14. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  15. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  16. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  17. Males and females first ________________ when two years old.
  18. Have you found your soul ________________?
  19. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  20. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  21. Excuse me, sorry ________________, you haven't got the time have you?
  22. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  23. The tree's ________________ was scarred by lightning strikes.
  24. Beijing is the ________________ of China.

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

Answer key

  1. trunk — of an elephant
  2. mine — an explosive
  3. degree — temperature
  4. file — a tool
  5. hand — help
  6. hand — part of the body
  7. kid — to tease
  8. trunk — of a car
  9. mine — for digging
  10. kid — child
  11. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  12. hand — in cards
  13. mine — belonging to me
  14. degree — from a university
  15. degree — an amount
  16. capital — money
  17. mate — to breed
  18. mate — a partner
  19. capital — a big letter
  20. file — a document
  21. mate — a friend
  22. file — a line of people
  23. trunk — of a tree
  24. capital — a city

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