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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. My partner was ________________ at the birth of our baby.
  2. That was a fun ________________.
  3. The water is too ________________.
  4. His birthday is in either ________________ or April.
  5. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  6. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  7. She laid her head on my ________________ so she could listen to my heartbeat.
  8. The band played a military ________________ at the parade.
  9. The ________________ was transferred to the cardiology ward.
  10. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  11. Actually, the ________________ method has plenty of room for improvement.
  12. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  13. The nurse administered an injection to the ________________.
  14. The train ________________ at six o'clock.
  15. The ________________ change colour in autumn.
  16. The lid of the ________________ creaked open.
  17. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  18. I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my ________________.
  19. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  20. We will have lived in Kyoto for eight years next ________________.
  21. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  22. He always ________________ the window open while he sleeps.
  23. The farmer was ________________ with the unruly horse.
  24. Did you get a birthday ________________ for him this year?

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

Answer key

  1. present — there
  2. game — a match
  3. cold — not warm
  4. march — the month
  5. clip — a video
  6. clip — for paper
  7. chest — of your body
  8. march — music
  9. patient — a sick person
  10. game — a kind of play
  11. present — the time now
  12. game — wild animals
  13. patient — a sick person
  14. leaves — to go away
  15. leaves — of a tree
  16. chest — a box
  17. cold — an illness
  18. chest — of your body
  19. clip — to cut
  20. march — the month
  21. cold — the Cold War
  22. leaves — lets stay
  23. patient — calm and waiting
  24. present — a gift

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