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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. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  2. I want a large ________________ of toothpaste.
  3. The strong ________________ blew his hat off.
  4. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  5. We are ________________ to obey laws.
  6. He put a rubber ________________ around the bundle of letters.
  7. It was raining hard, and to make things worse, the ________________ was beginning to rise.
  8. The water is too ________________.
  9. He's the lead singer in a rock ________________.
  10. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  11. That was ________________ to happen.
  12. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  13. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  14. I need a new inner ________________ for my bike tire.
  15. I'll be taking the ________________.
  16. He still wears his gold wedding ________________.
  17. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  18. He sold his goods at a loss to ________________ up his business.
  19. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  20. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.
  21. He reached out and took down a small leather ________________ book.
  22. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  23. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  24. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.

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

Answer key

  1. cold — the Cold War
  2. tube — a container
  3. wind — moving air
  4. hand — help
  5. bound — obliged
  6. band — a rubber band
  7. wind — moving air
  8. cold — not warm
  9. band — a music group
  10. hand — part of the body
  11. bound — certain
  12. cold — an illness
  13. hand — in cards
  14. tube — in a tire
  15. tube — the underground
  16. band — a ring
  17. prune — to trim
  18. wind — to turn a key
  19. field — farmland
  20. prune — to trim
  21. bound — tied together
  22. prune — the fruit
  23. field — for sport
  24. field — a subject

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