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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 had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  2. I was having a ________________ recording these guys.
  3. I've got the luggage in my ________________.
  4. Have you ever swallowed an apricot ________________?
  5. The King held a masked ________________.
  6. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  7. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  8. The tree's ________________ was scarred by lightning strikes.
  9. The elephant has a huge ________________.
  10. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  11. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  12. He was blown up by a land ________________.
  13. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  14. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  15. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  16. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  17. The kitten curled into a ________________.
  18. Boris sat near the fire ________________.
  19. The water is too ________________.
  20. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  21. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.
  22. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.
  23. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  24. Jarno Trulli was disqualified for passing a red light at the ________________ exit.

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

Answer key

  1. cold — an illness
  2. ball — a great time
  3. trunk — of a car
  4. pit — a fruit stone
  5. ball — a dance
  6. cold — the Cold War
  7. bat — the animal
  8. trunk — of a tree
  9. trunk — of an elephant
  10. wound — past of 'wind'
  11. wound — an injury
  12. mine — an explosive
  13. mine — for digging
  14. prune — to trim
  15. wound — an injury
  16. bat — in an idiom
  17. ball — a round shape
  18. pit — a hole
  19. cold — not warm
  20. prune — the fruit
  21. prune — to trim
  22. mine — belonging to me
  23. bat — for baseball
  24. pit — in a race

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