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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. I'd like to play a game of ________________.
  2. Cut the butternut ________________ into one-inch cubes.
  3. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  4. When are we going to ________________?
  5. The teacher called the ________________ to see who was absent.
  6. Turn up the ________________ so we can feel the beat.
  7. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  8. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  9. We're on a ________________ here.
  10. The fisherman caught a huge ________________.
  11. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  12. The president vowed to ________________ the mutiny.
  13. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  14. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  15. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  16. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  17. I play ________________ in a jazz band.
  18. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  19. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  20. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  21. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  22. The ball is in your ________________.
  23. Grandma has made a Swiss ________________.
  24. We ________________ up on opposing sides.

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

Answer key

  1. squash — the sport
  2. squash — the vegetable
  3. degree — an amount
  4. land — to come down
  5. roll — a list
  6. bass — low music
  7. court — of a king
  8. land — a country
  9. roll — on a roll
  10. bass — the fish
  11. kid — to tease
  12. squash — to crush
  13. land — ground
  14. wound — an injury
  15. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  16. wound — an injury
  17. bass — the instrument
  18. kid — child
  19. degree — temperature
  20. degree — from a university
  21. court — of law
  22. court — for sport
  23. roll — a cake
  24. wound — past of 'wind'

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