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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. Professor Sir Peter Hirsch formerly held the ________________.
  2. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  3. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  4. Manchester University ________________ is the university's academic publishing house.
  5. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  6. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  7. Did you ________________ the button?
  8. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  9. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.
  10. James Baker serves as an Honorary Co-________________ for the World Justice Project.
  11. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  12. I seem to be developing a ________________.
  13. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  14. We will have lived in Kyoto for eight years next ________________.
  15. The function of the ________________ is to provide the common people with facts.
  16. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  17. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  18. The band played a military ________________ at the parade.
  19. I put the bag on or beside the ________________.
  20. The party suffered for the ________________ of party-switching.
  21. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  22. His birthday is in either ________________ or April.
  23. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.
  24. Don't do anything ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. chair — a professorship
  2. capital — a big letter
  3. capital — a city
  4. press — a publisher
  5. capital — money
  6. degree — temperature
  7. press — to push
  8. prune — to trim
  9. shower — a meteor shower
  10. chair — a leader
  11. prune — the fruit
  12. rash — on the skin
  13. shower — to wash
  14. march — the month
  15. press — newspapers
  16. degree — from a university
  17. degree — an amount
  18. march — music
  19. chair — to sit on
  20. rash — a series
  21. shower — rain
  22. march — the month
  23. prune — to trim
  24. rash — hasty

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