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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 116 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. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  2. Spring is a pleasant ________________.
  3. James Baker serves as an Honorary Co-________________ for the World Justice Project.
  4. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  5. The strong ________________ blew his hat off.
  6. Did you ________________ the meat?
  7. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  8. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  9. He sold his goods at a loss to ________________ up his business.
  10. Professor Sir Peter Hirsch formerly held the ________________.
  11. The elephant has a huge ________________.
  12. He asked the witch to reverse the ________________.
  13. They retained the League and Cup in his second ________________.
  14. I've got the luggage in my ________________.
  15. How do you ________________ your surname?
  16. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  17. We've had a long dry ________________ this summer.
  18. It was raining hard, and to make things worse, the ________________ was beginning to rise.
  19. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  20. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  21. I put the bag on or beside the ________________.
  22. The tree's ________________ was scarred by lightning strikes.
  23. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  24. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. kid — to tease
  2. season — of the year
  3. chair — a leader
  4. degree — an amount
  5. wind — moving air
  6. season — to add flavour
  7. degree — from a university
  8. wound — an injury
  9. wind — to turn a key
  10. chair — a professorship
  11. trunk — of an elephant
  12. spell — magic
  13. season — in sport
  14. trunk — of a car
  15. spell — letters
  16. wound — past of 'wind'
  17. spell — a short time
  18. wind — moving air
  19. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  20. degree — temperature
  21. chair — to sit on
  22. trunk — of a tree
  23. wound — an injury
  24. kid — child

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