ClueBy
TodayArchiveWord list

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.

Make a worksheet

Students read each sentence and write the missing word. Every word appears in several sentences, each time with a different meaning.

Words on the sheet
468
Word bank
YesNo
↻ New worksheet

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. Place the flour, butter and salt into a large clean ________________.
  2. The girl drawing a picture in the first ________________ is my niece.
  3. When are we going to ________________?
  4. It's your turn to ________________ the ball down the lane.
  5. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  6. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  7. The ________________ of a dandelion is edible, too.
  8. There's no middle ________________.
  9. We had to ________________ the boat across the lake.
  10. The tree's ________________ was scarred by lightning strikes.
  11. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  12. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  13. Add some ________________ pepper to it.
  14. We need to address the ________________ of the problem.
  15. Millions watch the Super ________________ every February.
  16. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  17. The elephant has a huge ________________.
  18. The ________________ of 'teacher' is 'teach'.
  19. I've got the luggage in my ________________.
  20. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  21. The water is too ________________.
  22. The ________________ was covered with snow, as far as the eye could see.
  23. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  24. I had a ________________ with my boss today.

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

Answer key

  1. bowl — a dish
  2. row — a line
  3. land — to come down
  4. bowl — to roll
  5. clip — for paper
  6. land — ground
  7. root — of a plant
  8. ground — a position
  9. row — to paddle
  10. trunk — of a tree
  11. clip — a video
  12. land — a country
  13. ground — crushed
  14. root — the cause
  15. bowl — a football final
  16. clip — to cut
  17. trunk — of an elephant
  18. root — of a word
  19. trunk — of a car
  20. cold — an illness
  21. cold — not warm
  22. ground — the earth
  23. cold — the Cold War
  24. row — a quarrel

Multiple-meaning words list

Tick up to 10 words to build a worksheet with just those words.

Make a worksheet (0 words)

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