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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. I put the bag on or beside the ________________.
  2. In geometry, a flat surface is called a ________________.
  3. The ball is in your ________________.
  4. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  5. The ________________ was covered with snow, as far as the eye could see.
  6. James Baker serves as an Honorary Co-________________ for the World Justice Project.
  7. Professor Sir Peter Hirsch formerly held the ________________.
  8. Add some ________________ pepper to it.
  9. The carpenter used a ________________ to smooth the door.
  10. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  11. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  12. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  13. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  14. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.
  15. The ________________ took off on time.
  16. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  17. I need a ________________ to install the towel rack.
  18. There's no middle ________________.
  19. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  20. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  21. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  22. The soldiers did ________________ on the parade ground every morning.
  23. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  24. We had a fire ________________ at school today.

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

Answer key

  1. chair — to sit on
  2. plane — in geometry
  3. court — for sport
  4. degree — from a university
  5. ground — the earth
  6. chair — a leader
  7. chair — a professorship
  8. ground — crushed
  9. plane — a tool
  10. court — of law
  11. clip — a video
  12. clip — to cut
  13. clip — for paper
  14. shower — a meteor shower
  15. plane — an aircraft
  16. degree — temperature
  17. drill — the tool
  18. ground — a position
  19. shower — to wash
  20. shower — rain
  21. court — of a king
  22. drill — army training
  23. degree — an amount
  24. drill — a practice

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