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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 hotel is built around a mineral ________________.
  2. Don't do anything ________________.
  3. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  4. The water is too ________________.
  5. The flowers bloom in the ________________.
  6. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  7. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  8. Our bank has a ________________ near the station.
  9. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.
  10. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  11. What do you think of the new ________________?
  12. The party suffered for the ________________ of party-switching.
  13. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  14. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  15. He chopped down the ________________ with an ax.
  16. I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my ________________.
  17. Biology is a ________________ of science.
  18. She took a metal box from the top of the kitchen ________________.
  19. In all probability, the ________________ will fall.
  20. The lid of the ________________ creaked open.
  21. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  22. I seem to be developing a ________________.
  23. There's a broken ________________ in the bed.
  24. She laid her head on my ________________ so she could listen to my heartbeat.

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

Answer key

  1. spring — of water
  2. rash — hasty
  3. cold — an illness
  4. cold — not warm
  5. spring — the season
  6. cold — the Cold War
  7. field — for sport
  8. branch — of a bank
  9. prune — to trim
  10. prune — to trim
  11. cabinet — ministers
  12. rash — a series
  13. field — farmland
  14. prune — the fruit
  15. branch — of a tree
  16. chest — of your body
  17. branch — a division
  18. cabinet — a cupboard
  19. cabinet — ministers
  20. chest — a box
  21. field — a subject
  22. rash — on the skin
  23. spring — a coil
  24. chest — of your body

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