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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 116 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 museum has ________________ figures of famous people.
  2. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  3. It's one o'clock ________________.
  4. The King held a masked ________________.
  5. Cut the butternut ________________ into one-inch cubes.
  6. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  7. The kitten curled into a ________________.
  8. This knife is not ________________ enough.
  9. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  10. The moon will ________________ and wane.
  11. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  12. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  13. I'd like to play a game of ________________.
  14. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  15. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  16. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  17. The president vowed to ________________ the mutiny.
  18. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  19. He's quite ________________, isn't he?
  20. I was having a ________________ recording these guys.
  21. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  22. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  23. What's the best way to remove ear ________________?
  24. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.

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

Answer key

  1. wax — for sculpting
  2. field — a subject
  3. sharp — exactly
  4. ball — a dance
  5. squash — the vegetable
  6. clip — a video
  7. ball — a round shape
  8. sharp — with an edge
  9. kid — child
  10. wax — to grow
  11. bat — for baseball
  12. kid — to tease
  13. squash — the sport
  14. field — for sport
  15. field — farmland
  16. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  17. squash — to crush
  18. bat — in an idiom
  19. sharp — clever
  20. ball — a great time
  21. clip — to cut
  22. clip — for paper
  23. wax — in the ear
  24. bat — the 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