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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. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  2. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  3. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  4. ________________ is common in the lakes of Sweden.
  5. He sold his goods at a loss to ________________ up his business.
  6. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  7. At ________________, we arrived at the village.
  8. The birds use the scarecrow as a ________________.
  9. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  10. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  11. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  12. The owl hooted softly from its ________________.
  13. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!
  14. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  15. The strong ________________ blew his hat off.
  16. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.
  17. False peace will not ________________.
  18. It was raining hard, and to make things worse, the ________________ was beginning to rise.
  19. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  20. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  21. He was locked up in a ________________.
  22. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  23. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  24. Today is the ________________ day of the holidays. Back to school tomorrow!

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

Answer key

  1. hand — help
  2. hand — in cards
  3. content — happy
  4. perch — the fish
  5. wind — to turn a key
  6. degree — temperature
  7. last — finally
  8. perch — for a bird
  9. cell — in biology
  10. degree — an amount
  11. tear — from crying
  12. perch — for a bird
  13. cell — a phone
  14. content — the amount
  15. wind — moving air
  16. tear — to rip
  17. last — to go on
  18. wind — moving air
  19. degree — from a university
  20. content — videos and posts
  21. cell — in a prison
  22. hand — part of the body
  23. tear — from crying
  24. last — final

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