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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 need a ________________ to install the towel rack.
  2. His birthday is in either ________________ or April.
  3. Our bedroom windows ________________ the sea.
  4. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  5. Every pianist practices the C major ________________.
  6. Nobody expected a disaster on this ________________.
  7. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  8. He is an ace ________________.
  9. We had a fire ________________ at school today.
  10. She had a strange look on her ________________.
  11. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  12. Birch trees have smooth white ________________.
  13. The band played a military ________________ at the parade.
  14. The kitchen ________________ is next to the microwave.
  15. The soldiers did ________________ on the parade ground every morning.
  16. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  17. Our dog starts to ________________ whenever the doorbell rings.
  18. We will have lived in Kyoto for eight years next ________________.
  19. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.
  20. The water is too ________________.
  21. The ________________ will go to the well once too often.
  22. Sooner or later you'll have to ________________ the truth.
  23. The sergeant loved to ________________ orders at us.
  24. Fill up this ________________ with water.

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

Answer key

  1. drill — the tool
  2. march — the month
  3. face — to point toward
  4. cold — an illness
  5. scale — in music
  6. scale — size or range
  7. prune — the fruit
  8. pitcher — in baseball
  9. drill — a practice
  10. face — part of the head
  11. prune — to trim
  12. bark — of a tree
  13. march — music
  14. scale — for weighing
  15. drill — army training
  16. cold — the Cold War
  17. bark — a dog's sound
  18. march — the month
  19. prune — to trim
  20. cold — not warm
  21. pitcher — a jug
  22. face — to confront
  23. bark — to shout
  24. pitcher — a jug

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