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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. I would like to have a ________________ here.
  2. Sooner or later you'll have to ________________ the truth.
  3. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  4. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.
  5. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  6. I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my ________________.
  7. The lid of the ________________ creaked open.
  8. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  9. The ________________ of the members were all out of tune.
  10. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  11. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  12. She laid her head on my ________________ so she could listen to my heartbeat.
  13. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  14. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  15. She had a strange look on her ________________.
  16. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  17. I've got to change the light ________________.
  18. Because of the accident, he'll have a limp for the ________________ of his life.
  19. He was blown up by a land ________________.
  20. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  21. Plant the tulip ________________ before the first frost.
  22. Our bedroom windows ________________ the sea.
  23. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  24. The light ________________ burned out.

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

Answer key

  1. rest — a break
  2. face — to confront
  3. capital — a big letter
  4. mine — belonging to me
  5. clip — to cut
  6. chest — of your body
  7. chest — a box
  8. capital — money
  9. rest — what's left
  10. capital — a city
  11. clip — a video
  12. chest — of your body
  13. bat — the animal
  14. bat — for baseball
  15. face — part of the head
  16. bat — in an idiom
  17. bulb — for light
  18. rest — what's left
  19. mine — an explosive
  20. mine — for digging
  21. bulb — of a plant
  22. face — to point toward
  23. clip — for paper
  24. bulb — for light

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