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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. Can you turn the ________________ on?
  2. I'd like to play a game of ________________.
  3. Later, his shop becomes a ________________ with young dancers.
  4. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  5. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  6. The soldiers did ________________ on the parade ground every morning.
  7. Are you a huge ________________ of trains?
  8. My rich neighbors belong to a private golf ________________.
  9. I am not a ________________ of shrimp.
  10. Winning one ________________ isn't the same as dominating a sport.
  11. We had a fire ________________ at school today.
  12. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  13. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  14. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  15. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  16. I belonged to the harmonica ________________ in my high school days.
  17. I need a ________________ to install the towel rack.
  18. Only by prohibiting all nuclear weapons, we can together stop the arms ________________.
  19. Cut the butternut ________________ into one-inch cubes.
  20. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  21. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  22. Atomic bombs are a danger to the human ________________.
  23. The president vowed to ________________ the mutiny.
  24. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.

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

Answer key

  1. fan — to cool the air
  2. squash — the sport
  3. club — for dancing
  4. field — a subject
  5. bat — the animal
  6. drill — army training
  7. fan — a supporter
  8. club — for golf
  9. fan — a supporter
  10. race — a contest
  11. drill — a practice
  12. field — for sport
  13. bat — in an idiom
  14. field — farmland
  15. hand — part of the body
  16. club — a group
  17. drill — the tool
  18. race — the arms race
  19. squash — the vegetable
  20. hand — help
  21. hand — in cards
  22. race — humankind
  23. squash — to crush
  24. bat — for baseball

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