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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. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  2. We ________________ that the plan would end in failure.
  3. When I ________________ my fingers, you'll wake up.
  4. Don't ________________ out at me just because you're upset.
  5. Our dog starts to ________________ whenever the doorbell rings.
  6. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  7. Birch trees have smooth white ________________.
  8. The water is too ________________.
  9. The sergeant loved to ________________ orders at us.
  10. Only by prohibiting all nuclear weapons, we can together stop the arms ________________.
  11. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  12. She's very handy with a ________________.
  13. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  14. ________________ out of it! You haven't done a thing all week.
  15. He works in a ________________ mill.
  16. He's the lead singer in a rock ________________.
  17. The spa offers ________________ extensions.
  18. Atomic bombs are a danger to the human ________________.
  19. He put a rubber ________________ around the bundle of letters.
  20. He felt the sting of the whip's ________________.
  21. He still wears his gold wedding ________________.
  22. Winning one ________________ isn't the same as dominating a sport.
  23. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.
  24. You don't have to ________________ at me like that.

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

Answer key

  1. shower — to wash
  2. saw — past of 'see'
  3. snap — to click
  4. lash — to lash out
  5. bark — a dog's sound
  6. cold — an illness
  7. bark — of a tree
  8. cold — not warm
  9. bark — to shout
  10. race — the arms race
  11. shower — rain
  12. saw — the tool
  13. cold — the Cold War
  14. snap — to snap out of it
  15. saw — the tool
  16. band — a music group
  17. lash — an eyelash
  18. race — humankind
  19. band — a rubber band
  20. lash — a whip stroke
  21. band — a ring
  22. race — a contest
  23. shower — a meteor shower
  24. snap — to speak sharply

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