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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 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.

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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. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  2. Sooner or later you'll have to ________________ the truth.
  3. Remember our ________________: no talking to strangers, no matter what.
  4. He put a rubber ________________ around the bundle of letters.
  5. Will civil ________________ and democracy continue in Algeria?
  6. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  7. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  8. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  9. The chairman did not ________________ out the possibility of a disagreement.
  10. He still wears his gold wedding ________________.
  11. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  12. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  13. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  14. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  15. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  16. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  17. He's the lead singer in a rock ________________.
  18. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  19. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  20. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  21. She had a strange look on her ________________.
  22. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  23. Our bedroom windows ________________ the sea.
  24. That was a fun ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. degree — from a university
  2. face — to confront
  3. rule — a law
  4. band — a rubber band
  5. rule — government
  6. bat — for baseball
  7. degree — an amount
  8. kid — to tease
  9. rule — to rule out
  10. band — a ring
  11. wound — an injury
  12. game — a kind of play
  13. bat — in an idiom
  14. game — wild animals
  15. bat — the animal
  16. wound — an injury
  17. band — a music group
  18. wound — past of 'wind'
  19. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  20. kid — child
  21. face — part of the head
  22. degree — temperature
  23. face — to point toward
  24. game — a match

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