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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. The moon will ________________ and wane.
  2. The goat rested comfortably on a soft bed of ________________.
  3. Manchester University ________________ is the university's academic publishing house.
  4. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  5. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  6. One ________________ from a giraffe's hind leg is enough to kill a lion.
  7. I get a ________________ out of her cheerful personality.
  8. Did you ________________ the button?
  9. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  10. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  11. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  12. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  13. A drowning man will clutch at a ________________.
  14. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  15. They were given a penalty ________________ just minutes from the end.
  16. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  17. What's the best way to remove ear ________________?
  18. The museum has ________________ figures of famous people.
  19. It always has to be a ________________ man with them.
  20. That was a fun ________________.
  21. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  22. The function of the ________________ is to provide the common people with facts.
  23. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  24. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.

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

Answer key

  1. wax — to grow
  2. straw — dry grass
  3. press — a publisher
  4. clip — to cut
  5. clip — a video
  6. kick — with a leg
  7. kick — a thrill
  8. press — to push
  9. clip — for paper
  10. bat — for baseball
  11. hand — in cards
  12. game — wild animals
  13. straw — to clutch at straws
  14. hand — part of the body
  15. kick — in football
  16. game — a kind of play
  17. wax — in the ear
  18. wax — for sculpting
  19. straw — a straw man
  20. game — a match
  21. bat — the animal
  22. press — newspapers
  23. hand — help
  24. bat — in an idiom

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