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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 had a ________________ with my boss today.
  2. In jazz, ________________ was gradually being replaced by bebop.
  3. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  4. He was locked up in a ________________.
  5. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  6. The coach helped Matthew straighten out his golf ________________, improving his game.
  7. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.
  8. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  9. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  10. David sat on the ________________.
  11. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  12. The girl drawing a picture in the first ________________ is my niece.
  13. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  14. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  15. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  16. That was a fun ________________.
  17. He was blown up by a land ________________.
  18. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!
  19. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  20. There's a broken ________________ in the bed.
  21. The hotel is built around a mineral ________________.
  22. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  23. The flowers bloom in the ________________.
  24. We had to ________________ the boat across the lake.

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

Answer key

  1. row — a quarrel
  2. swing — music
  3. degree — an amount
  4. cell — in a prison
  5. content — happy
  6. swing — in golf
  7. mine — belonging to me
  8. content — the amount
  9. cell — in biology
  10. swing — to play on
  11. degree — from a university
  12. row — a line
  13. game — a kind of play
  14. content — videos and posts
  15. degree — temperature
  16. game — a match
  17. mine — an explosive
  18. cell — a phone
  19. game — wild animals
  20. spring — a coil
  21. spring — of water
  22. mine — for digging
  23. spring — the season
  24. row — to paddle

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