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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. Will civil ________________ and democracy continue in Algeria?
  2. I assure you, everything's ________________.
  3. The water is too ________________.
  4. A ________________ is a sweet brown fruit from a palm tree.
  5. Friends gathered at the ________________ to remember him.
  6. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  7. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  8. The chairman did not ________________ out the possibility of a disagreement.
  9. I got a ________________ for parking in the wrong place.
  10. This shop sells ________________ wines and cheeses.
  11. The speedboat left a long ________________ behind it.
  12. Remember our ________________: no talking to strangers, no matter what.
  13. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  14. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  15. The soldiers did ________________ on the parade ground every morning.
  16. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  17. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  18. Have you settled on a ________________?
  19. Why do cosmetics have an expiration ________________?
  20. I didn't ________________ up well this morning.
  21. I need a ________________ to install the towel rack.
  22. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  23. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  24. We had a fire ________________ at school today.

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

Answer key

  1. rule — government
  2. fine — all right
  3. cold — not warm
  4. date — the fruit
  5. wake — before a funeral
  6. cold — an illness
  7. file — a document
  8. rule — to rule out
  9. fine — a penalty
  10. fine — high quality
  11. wake — a trail
  12. rule — a law
  13. cold — the Cold War
  14. file — a tool
  15. drill — army training
  16. degree — from a university
  17. degree — an amount
  18. date — on the calendar
  19. date — on the calendar
  20. wake — to stop sleeping
  21. drill — the tool
  22. file — a line of people
  23. degree — temperature
  24. drill — a practice

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