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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 band played a military ________________ at the parade.
  2. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  3. When are we going to ________________?
  4. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  5. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  6. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  7. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  8. False peace will not ________________.
  9. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  10. The big green plant was starting to droop at the ________________.
  11. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.
  12. The water is too ________________.
  13. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  14. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  15. Today is the ________________ day of the holidays. Back to school tomorrow!
  16. At ________________, we arrived at the village.
  17. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  18. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.
  19. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  20. We will have lived in Kyoto for eight years next ________________.
  21. Many English words ________________ from Latin.
  22. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  23. His birthday is in either ________________ or April.
  24. Scientists study ________________ cells to repair damaged tissue.

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

Answer key

  1. march — music
  2. prune — to trim
  3. land — to come down
  4. shower — to wash
  5. land — a country
  6. shower — rain
  7. prune — the fruit
  8. last — to go on
  9. land — ground
  10. stem — of a plant
  11. shower — a meteor shower
  12. cold — not warm
  13. field — for sport
  14. cold — the Cold War
  15. last — final
  16. last — finally
  17. field — a subject
  18. prune — to trim
  19. cold — an illness
  20. march — the month
  21. stem — to come from
  22. field — farmland
  23. march — the month
  24. stem — a stem cell

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