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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. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  2. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  3. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  4. The players ran onto the football ________________.
  5. It was raining hard, and to make things worse, the ________________ was beginning to rise.
  6. He sold his goods at a loss to ________________ up his business.
  7. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  8. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  9. The hotel is built around a mineral ________________.
  10. There's a broken ________________ in the bed.
  11. She's preparing to ________________ her idea to the investors.
  12. The room was ________________ black, so I couldn't see a thing.
  13. The kitchen ________________ is next to the microwave.
  14. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  15. The flowers bloom in the ________________.
  16. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  17. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  18. Take your time. There's no ________________.
  19. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.
  20. You shouldn't ________________ things.
  21. That must've been a ________________.
  22. The strong ________________ blew his hat off.
  23. Every pianist practices the C major ________________.
  24. Nobody expected a disaster on this ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. tear — from crying
  2. tear — from crying
  3. field — a subject
  4. pitch — a sports field
  5. wind — moving air
  6. wind — to turn a key
  7. hand — in cards
  8. field — farmland
  9. spring — of water
  10. spring — a coil
  11. pitch — a sales talk
  12. pitch — completely
  13. scale — for weighing
  14. hand — help
  15. spring — the season
  16. hand — part of the body
  17. field — for sport
  18. rush — hurry
  19. tear — to rip
  20. rush — to hurry
  21. rush — a thrill
  22. wind — moving air
  23. scale — in music
  24. scale — size or range

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