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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. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  2. At ________________, we arrived at the village.
  3. We usually eat with a knife, ________________ and spoon.
  4. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  5. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  6. Every pianist practices the C major ________________.
  7. Today is the ________________ day of the holidays. Back to school tomorrow!
  8. The kitchen ________________ is next to the microwave.
  9. Use a garden ________________ to turn the soil.
  10. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  11. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  12. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  13. That was a fun ________________.
  14. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  15. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  16. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  17. Nobody expected a disaster on this ________________.
  18. He hit the ball with his ________________.
  19. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  20. I haven't touched a tennis ________________ in years.
  21. False peace will not ________________.
  22. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  23. Our cat is sitting in the apple tree, and the birds are making a ________________.
  24. We came to a ________________ in the road and had no idea which direction to go.

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

Answer key

  1. degree — an amount
  2. last — finally
  3. fork — to eat with
  4. game — wild animals
  5. clip — a video
  6. scale — in music
  7. last — final
  8. scale — for weighing
  9. fork — a garden tool
  10. clip — to cut
  11. game — a kind of play
  12. field — farmland
  13. game — a match
  14. clip — for paper
  15. field — a subject
  16. field — for sport
  17. scale — size or range
  18. racket — for tennis
  19. degree — temperature
  20. racket — for tennis
  21. last — to go on
  22. degree — from a university
  23. racket — a loud noise
  24. fork — in a road

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