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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 felt an uncomfortable tightness in my ________________.
  2. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  3. The moon will ________________ and wane.
  4. The lid of the ________________ creaked open.
  5. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  6. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  7. A drowning man will clutch at a ________________.
  8. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  9. The goat rested comfortably on a soft bed of ________________.
  10. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  11. Can you turn the ________________ on?
  12. The museum has ________________ figures of famous people.
  13. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  14. The ball is in your ________________.
  15. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  16. What's the best way to remove ear ________________?
  17. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  18. I am not a ________________ of shrimp.
  19. She laid her head on my ________________ so she could listen to my heartbeat.
  20. Are you a huge ________________ of trains?
  21. It always has to be a ________________ man with them.
  22. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  23. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  24. The water is too ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. chest — of your body
  2. file — a line of people
  3. wax — to grow
  4. chest — a box
  5. kid — to tease
  6. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  7. straw — to clutch at straws
  8. file — a tool
  9. straw — dry grass
  10. cold — the Cold War
  11. fan — to cool the air
  12. wax — for sculpting
  13. court — of a king
  14. court — for sport
  15. court — of law
  16. wax — in the ear
  17. cold — an illness
  18. fan — a supporter
  19. chest — of your body
  20. fan — a supporter
  21. straw — a straw man
  22. kid — child
  23. file — a document
  24. cold — not warm

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