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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. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  2. Doesn't taking care of babies ________________ you?
  3. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  4. I need a new inner ________________ for my bike tire.
  5. Use a drill to ________________ a hole in the wall.
  6. When are we going to ________________?
  7. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  8. I'll be taking the ________________.
  9. The ball is in your ________________.
  10. The polar ice ________________ is melting.
  11. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  12. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  13. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  14. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  15. It's best to wear a ________________ on your head during the cold Moscow winters.
  16. I want a large ________________ of toothpaste.
  17. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  18. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  19. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  20. She ________________ him three sons and a daughter.
  21. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  22. The water is too ________________.
  23. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  24. Can you put the ________________ back on the pen?

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

Answer key

  1. degree — an amount
  2. bore — to tire
  3. court — of law
  4. tube — in a tire
  5. bore — to drill
  6. land — to come down
  7. clip — to cut
  8. tube — the underground
  9. court — for sport
  10. cap — of ice
  11. cold — an illness
  12. land — a country
  13. degree — temperature
  14. clip — a video
  15. cap — a hat
  16. tube — a container
  17. clip — for paper
  18. court — of a king
  19. land — ground
  20. bore — gave birth
  21. cold — the Cold War
  22. cold — not warm
  23. degree — from a university
  24. cap — a lid

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