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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. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  2. Are you a huge ________________ of trains?
  3. It was raining hard, and to make things worse, the ________________ was beginning to rise.
  4. He sold his goods at a loss to ________________ up his business.
  5. The water is too ________________.
  6. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  7. Many happy returns to all who ________________ the name of a flower!
  8. The strong ________________ blew his hat off.
  9. Can you turn the ________________ on?
  10. The room was ________________ black, so I couldn't see a thing.
  11. The King held a masked ________________.
  12. That was a fun ________________.
  13. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  14. The kitten curled into a ________________.
  15. A black ________________ roamed the forest.
  16. She's preparing to ________________ her idea to the investors.
  17. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  18. The little girl was crying for the teddy ________________.
  19. I was having a ________________ recording these guys.
  20. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  21. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  22. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  23. I am not a ________________ of shrimp.
  24. The players ran onto the football ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. clip — to cut
  2. fan — a supporter
  3. wind — moving air
  4. wind — to turn a key
  5. cold — not warm
  6. cold — an illness
  7. bear — to put up with
  8. wind — moving air
  9. fan — to cool the air
  10. pitch — completely
  11. ball — a dance
  12. game — a match
  13. game — a kind of play
  14. ball — a round shape
  15. bear — the animal
  16. pitch — a sales talk
  17. game — wild animals
  18. bear — the animal
  19. ball — a great time
  20. clip — a video
  21. clip — for paper
  22. cold — the Cold War
  23. fan — a supporter
  24. pitch — a sports field

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