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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. I don't want to ________________ the boat.
  2. Males and females first ________________ when two years old.
  3. It always has to be a ________________ man with them.
  4. Which do you like better, ________________ music or classical music?
  5. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  6. Have you found your soul ________________?
  7. The water is too ________________.
  8. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  9. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  10. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  11. The goat rested comfortably on a soft bed of ________________.
  12. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  13. We were using a ________________ as a seat.
  14. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  15. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  16. A drowning man will clutch at a ________________.
  17. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  18. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!
  19. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  20. Excuse me, sorry ________________, you haven't got the time have you?
  21. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  22. He was locked up in a ________________.
  23. That was a fun ________________.
  24. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.

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

Answer key

  1. rock — to move gently
  2. mate — to breed
  3. straw — a straw man
  4. rock — music
  5. capital — a city
  6. mate — a partner
  7. cold — not warm
  8. capital — money
  9. capital — a big letter
  10. game — a kind of play
  11. straw — dry grass
  12. cold — the Cold War
  13. rock — a stone
  14. file — a document
  15. cell — in biology
  16. straw — to clutch at straws
  17. file — a line of people
  18. cell — a phone
  19. file — a tool
  20. mate — a friend
  21. game — wild animals
  22. cell — in a prison
  23. game — a match
  24. cold — an illness

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