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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. Birch trees have smooth white ________________.
  2. Take your time. There's no ________________.
  3. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  4. There's a broken ________________ in the bed.
  5. What was your ________________ profit last year?
  6. You shouldn't ________________ things.
  7. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  8. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.
  9. He took the fish out of the ________________.
  10. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  11. That must've been a ________________.
  12. The sergeant loved to ________________ orders at us.
  13. The giraffe did all she could to defend her ________________.
  14. The flowers bloom in the ________________.
  15. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  16. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  17. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  18. Our dog starts to ________________ whenever the doorbell rings.
  19. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  20. He had ________________ pain while walking.
  21. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  22. The hotel is built around a mineral ________________.
  23. The ball hit the back of the ________________.
  24. The giraffe protected her ________________ with great courage.

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

Answer key

  1. bark — of a tree
  2. rush — hurry
  3. degree — an amount
  4. spring — a coil
  5. net — after costs
  6. rush — to hurry
  7. hand — in cards
  8. shower — a meteor shower
  9. net — for catching
  10. hand — help
  11. rush — a thrill
  12. bark — to shout
  13. calf — a young animal
  14. spring — the season
  15. shower — rain
  16. hand — part of the body
  17. degree — from a university
  18. bark — a dog's sound
  19. degree — temperature
  20. calf — of the leg
  21. shower — to wash
  22. spring — of water
  23. net — in sport
  24. calf — a young animal

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