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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. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.
  2. The girl drawing a picture in the first ________________ is my niece.
  3. ________________ out of it! You haven't done a thing all week.
  4. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  5. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  6. Winning one ________________ isn't the same as dominating a sport.
  7. When I ________________ my fingers, you'll wake up.
  8. I had a ________________ with my boss today.
  9. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  10. Atomic bombs are a danger to the human ________________.
  11. His birthday is in either ________________ or April.
  12. He was blown up by a land ________________.
  13. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!
  14. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  15. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  16. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  17. He was locked up in a ________________.
  18. When are we going to ________________?
  19. We will have lived in Kyoto for eight years next ________________.
  20. We had to ________________ the boat across the lake.
  21. You don't have to ________________ at me like that.
  22. Only by prohibiting all nuclear weapons, we can together stop the arms ________________.
  23. The band played a military ________________ at the parade.
  24. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. mine — belonging to me
  2. row — a line
  3. snap — to snap out of it
  4. file — a tool
  5. cell — in biology
  6. race — a contest
  7. snap — to click
  8. row — a quarrel
  9. mine — for digging
  10. race — humankind
  11. march — the month
  12. mine — an explosive
  13. cell — a phone
  14. land — ground
  15. file — a document
  16. land — a country
  17. cell — in a prison
  18. land — to come down
  19. march — the month
  20. row — to paddle
  21. snap — to speak sharply
  22. race — the arms race
  23. march — music
  24. file — a line of people

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