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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. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  2. He put a rubber ________________ around the bundle of letters.
  3. The owl hooted softly from its ________________.
  4. He's the lead singer in a rock ________________.
  5. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  6. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  7. The surfers were looking for the perfect ________________.
  8. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  9. The birds use the scarecrow as a ________________.
  10. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  11. A lot of friends came to ________________ goodbye to me.
  12. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  13. I am seized by an uncontrollable ________________ of sadness.
  14. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  15. He still wears his gold wedding ________________.
  16. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  17. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  18. ________________ is common in the lakes of Sweden.
  19. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  20. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.
  21. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  22. The water is too ________________.
  23. The ball is in your ________________.
  24. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. tear — from crying
  2. band — a rubber band
  3. perch — for a bird
  4. band — a music group
  5. capital — a city
  6. capital — a big letter
  7. wave — of the sea
  8. content — happy
  9. perch — for a bird
  10. court — of law
  11. wave — with your hand
  12. tear — from crying
  13. wave — a sudden rise
  14. capital — money
  15. band — a ring
  16. content — the amount
  17. court — of a king
  18. perch — the fish
  19. cold — the Cold War
  20. tear — to rip
  21. cold — an illness
  22. cold — not warm
  23. court — for sport
  24. content — videos and posts

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