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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. Our dog starts to ________________ whenever the doorbell rings.
  2. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  3. The lid of the ________________ creaked open.
  4. Wood does not conduct electric ________________.
  5. I had a ________________ with my boss today.
  6. I seem to be developing a ________________.
  7. He put a rubber ________________ around the bundle of letters.
  8. The water is too ________________.
  9. Let us try to swim against the ________________.
  10. We had to ________________ the boat across the lake.
  11. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  12. He's the lead singer in a rock ________________.
  13. Birch trees have smooth white ________________.
  14. He still wears his gold wedding ________________.
  15. The sergeant loved to ________________ orders at us.
  16. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  17. I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my ________________.
  18. The party suffered for the ________________ of party-switching.
  19. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  20. The girl drawing a picture in the first ________________ is my niece.
  21. Here is a list of ________________ job openings.
  22. Don't do anything ________________.
  23. She laid her head on my ________________ so she could listen to my heartbeat.
  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. bark — a dog's sound
  2. content — happy
  3. chest — a box
  4. current — electric
  5. row — a quarrel
  6. rash — on the skin
  7. band — a rubber band
  8. cold — not warm
  9. current — of water
  10. row — to paddle
  11. cold — an illness
  12. band — a music group
  13. bark — of a tree
  14. band — a ring
  15. bark — to shout
  16. content — the amount
  17. chest — of your body
  18. rash — a series
  19. cold — the Cold War
  20. row — a line
  21. current — happening now
  22. rash — hasty
  23. chest — of your body
  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