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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. ________________ you help me carry this box?
  2. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  3. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  4. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  5. Recycle the empty soda ________________.
  6. Tom opened a ________________ of soup.
  7. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  8. The birds use the scarecrow as a ________________.
  9. A ________________ is equal to sixteen ounces.
  10. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  11. The owl hooted softly from its ________________.
  12. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  13. The water is too ________________.
  14. Jeff had to ________________ the pavement for three months before he found a job.
  15. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  16. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  17. ________________ is common in the lakes of Sweden.
  18. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  19. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  20. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  21. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  22. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  23. Rodrigo's family went to the dog ________________ to adopt a dog.
  24. This looks like a gunshot ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. can — to be able to
  2. bat — in an idiom
  3. clip — to cut
  4. clip — a video
  5. can — a tin
  6. can — a tin
  7. content — happy
  8. perch — for a bird
  9. pound — a weight
  10. cold — an illness
  11. perch — for a bird
  12. bat — for baseball
  13. cold — not warm
  14. pound — to hit hard
  15. content — the amount
  16. wound — past of 'wind'
  17. perch — the fish
  18. bat — the animal
  19. cold — the Cold War
  20. content — videos and posts
  21. wound — an injury
  22. clip — for paper
  23. pound — for dogs
  24. wound — an injury

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