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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. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  2. The water is too ________________.
  3. The train ________________ at six o'clock.
  4. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  5. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  6. The elephant has a huge ________________.
  7. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  8. He always ________________ the window open while he sleeps.
  9. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.
  10. He put a rubber ________________ around the bundle of letters.
  11. The sergeant loved to ________________ orders at us.
  12. A ________________ is a sweet brown fruit from a palm tree.
  13. Birch trees have smooth white ________________.
  14. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.
  15. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  16. Why do cosmetics have an expiration ________________?
  17. He still wears his gold wedding ________________.
  18. The ________________ change colour in autumn.
  19. I've got the luggage in my ________________.
  20. Our dog starts to ________________ whenever the doorbell rings.
  21. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  22. The tree's ________________ was scarred by lightning strikes.
  23. He's the lead singer in a rock ________________.
  24. Have you settled on a ________________?

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

Answer key

  1. prune — to trim
  2. cold — not warm
  3. leaves — to go away
  4. cold — an illness
  5. tear — from crying
  6. trunk — of an elephant
  7. tear — from crying
  8. leaves — lets stay
  9. prune — to trim
  10. band — a rubber band
  11. bark — to shout
  12. date — the fruit
  13. bark — of a tree
  14. tear — to rip
  15. prune — the fruit
  16. date — on the calendar
  17. band — a ring
  18. leaves — of a tree
  19. trunk — of a car
  20. bark — a dog's sound
  21. cold — the Cold War
  22. trunk — of a tree
  23. band — a music group
  24. date — on the calendar

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