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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 120 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. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  2. This knife is not ________________ enough.
  3. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  4. It's one o'clock ________________.
  5. He was locked up in a ________________.
  6. I've got the luggage in my ________________.
  7. The water is too ________________.
  8. He's quite ________________, isn't he?
  9. We need to address the ________________ of the problem.
  10. The ________________ of a dandelion is edible, too.
  11. The elephant has a huge ________________.
  12. That was a fun ________________.
  13. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  14. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  15. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  16. The ________________ of 'teacher' is 'teach'.
  17. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!
  18. The tree's ________________ was scarred by lightning strikes.
  19. Winning one ________________ isn't the same as dominating a sport.
  20. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  21. Atomic bombs are a danger to the human ________________.
  22. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  23. Only by prohibiting all nuclear weapons, we can together stop the arms ________________.
  24. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.

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

Answer key

  1. field — a subject
  2. sharp — with an edge
  3. field — farmland
  4. sharp — exactly
  5. cell — in a prison
  6. trunk — of a car
  7. cold — not warm
  8. sharp — clever
  9. root — the cause
  10. root — of a plant
  11. trunk — of an elephant
  12. game — a match
  13. cell — in biology
  14. cold — an illness
  15. game — a kind of play
  16. root — of a word
  17. cell — a phone
  18. trunk — of a tree
  19. race — a contest
  20. field — for sport
  21. race — humankind
  22. game — wild animals
  23. race — the arms race
  24. cold — the Cold War

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