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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. The birds use the scarecrow as a ________________.
  2. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  3. He was blown up by a land ________________.
  4. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  5. What's the difference between broth and ________________?
  6. The water is too ________________.
  7. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  8. The supermarket has a large ________________ of merchandise.
  9. The ________________ market has crashed.
  10. He is as ________________ as a wolf.
  11. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  12. Vegetables slowly ________________ towards the light.
  13. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  14. ________________ is common in the lakes of Sweden.
  15. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  16. Don't ________________ against the wall. It's just been painted.
  17. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  18. The owl hooted softly from its ________________.
  19. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  20. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  21. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  22. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  23. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  24. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.

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

Answer key

  1. perch — for a bird
  2. capital — money
  3. mine — an explosive
  4. cold — the Cold War
  5. stock — a soup base
  6. cold — not warm
  7. cold — an illness
  8. stock — goods
  9. stock — shares
  10. lean — thin
  11. capital — a big letter
  12. lean — to bend
  13. field — a subject
  14. perch — the fish
  15. file — a line of people
  16. lean — to rest against
  17. file — a document
  18. perch — for a bird
  19. mine — for digging
  20. file — a tool
  21. field — for sport
  22. field — farmland
  23. capital — a city
  24. mine — belonging to me

Multiple-meaning words list

Tick up to 10 words to build a worksheet with just those words.

Make a worksheet (0 words)

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