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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. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  2. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  3. The owl hooted softly from its ________________.
  4. He put a rubber ________________ around the bundle of letters.
  5. The band played a military ________________ at the parade.
  6. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  7. Biology is a ________________ of science.
  8. The ball hit the back of the ________________.
  9. ________________ is common in the lakes of Sweden.
  10. He still wears his gold wedding ________________.
  11. He took the fish out of the ________________.
  12. He chopped down the ________________ with an ax.
  13. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  14. His birthday is in either ________________ or April.
  15. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  16. Our bank has a ________________ near the station.
  17. The water is too ________________.
  18. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  19. What was your ________________ profit last year?
  20. He's the lead singer in a rock ________________.
  21. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  22. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  23. The birds use the scarecrow as a ________________.
  24. We will have lived in Kyoto for eight years next ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. field — farmland
  2. cold — the Cold War
  3. perch — for a bird
  4. band — a rubber band
  5. march — music
  6. file — a document
  7. branch — a division
  8. net — in sport
  9. perch — the fish
  10. band — a ring
  11. net — for catching
  12. branch — of a tree
  13. file — a tool
  14. march — the month
  15. field — a subject
  16. branch — of a bank
  17. cold — not warm
  18. field — for sport
  19. net — after costs
  20. band — a music group
  21. cold — an illness
  22. file — a line of people
  23. perch — for a bird
  24. march — the month

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