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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. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  2. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  3. The ball is in your ________________.
  4. This piece is in a major ________________.
  5. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  6. When are we going to ________________?
  7. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  8. Atomic bombs are a danger to the human ________________.
  9. The president vowed to ________________ the mutiny.
  10. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  11. Cut the butternut ________________ into one-inch cubes.
  12. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  13. Winning one ________________ isn't the same as dominating a sport.
  14. I'd like to play a game of ________________.
  15. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  16. Are you the only one who has a ________________ to this door?
  17. A drowning man will clutch at a ________________.
  18. The goat rested comfortably on a soft bed of ________________.
  19. It always has to be a ________________ man with them.
  20. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  21. Hard work is the ________________ to success.
  22. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  23. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  24. Only by prohibiting all nuclear weapons, we can together stop the arms ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. court — of law
  2. file — a line of people
  3. court — for sport
  4. key — in music
  5. degree — an amount
  6. land — to come down
  7. degree — from a university
  8. race — humankind
  9. squash — to crush
  10. land — ground
  11. squash — the vegetable
  12. land — a country
  13. race — a contest
  14. squash — the sport
  15. court — of a king
  16. key — for a lock
  17. straw — to clutch at straws
  18. straw — dry grass
  19. straw — a straw man
  20. file — a tool
  21. key — the most important part
  22. file — a document
  23. degree — temperature
  24. race — the arms race

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