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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. Did you ________________ the meat?
  2. Turn up the ________________ so we can feel the beat.
  3. When are we going to ________________?
  4. He was blown up by a land ________________.
  5. He's quite ________________, isn't he?
  6. Doesn't taking care of babies ________________ you?
  7. This knife is not ________________ enough.
  8. They retained the League and Cup in his second ________________.
  9. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  10. Spring is a pleasant ________________.
  11. She ________________ him three sons and a daughter.
  12. I play ________________ in a jazz band.
  13. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  14. Use a drill to ________________ a hole in the wall.
  15. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.
  16. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  17. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  18. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  19. The water is too ________________.
  20. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  21. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.
  22. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  23. The fisherman caught a huge ________________.
  24. It's one o'clock ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. season — to add flavour
  2. bass — low music
  3. land — to come down
  4. mine — an explosive
  5. sharp — clever
  6. bore — to tire
  7. sharp — with an edge
  8. season — in sport
  9. cold — an illness
  10. season — of the year
  11. bore — gave birth
  12. bass — the instrument
  13. mine — for digging
  14. bore — to drill
  15. shower — a meteor shower
  16. land — ground
  17. shower — rain
  18. cold — the Cold War
  19. cold — not warm
  20. land — a country
  21. mine — belonging to me
  22. shower — to wash
  23. bass — the fish
  24. sharp — exactly

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