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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. The ball is in your ________________.
  2. Many English words ________________ from Latin.
  3. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  4. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  5. The big green plant was starting to droop at the ________________.
  6. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  7. He is as ________________ as a wolf.
  8. Scientists study ________________ cells to repair damaged tissue.
  9. Vegetables slowly ________________ towards the light.
  10. Remember our ________________: no talking to strangers, no matter what.
  11. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  12. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  13. That was a fun ________________.
  14. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  15. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  16. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  17. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  18. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  19. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  20. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  21. Will civil ________________ and democracy continue in Algeria?
  22. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  23. The chairman did not ________________ out the possibility of a disagreement.
  24. Don't ________________ against the wall. It's just been painted.

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

Answer key

  1. court — for sport
  2. stem — to come from
  3. field — a subject
  4. field — farmland
  5. stem — of a plant
  6. game — a kind of play
  7. lean — thin
  8. stem — a stem cell
  9. lean — to bend
  10. rule — a law
  11. court — of law
  12. game — wild animals
  13. game — a match
  14. field — for sport
  15. kid — child
  16. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  17. wound — an injury
  18. kid — to tease
  19. wound — past of 'wind'
  20. court — of a king
  21. rule — government
  22. wound — an injury
  23. rule — to rule out
  24. lean — to rest against

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