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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 had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  2. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  3. Professor Sir Peter Hirsch formerly held the ________________.
  4. He chopped down the ________________ with an ax.
  5. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  6. How do you ________________ your surname?
  7. Biology is a ________________ of science.
  8. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  9. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  10. Our bank has a ________________ near the station.
  11. The water is too ________________.
  12. We've had a long dry ________________ this summer.
  13. David sat on the ________________.
  14. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  15. James Baker serves as an Honorary Co-________________ for the World Justice Project.
  16. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  17. In jazz, ________________ was gradually being replaced by bebop.
  18. He asked the witch to reverse the ________________.
  19. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  20. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  21. The coach helped Matthew straighten out his golf ________________, improving his game.
  22. I put the bag on or beside the ________________.
  23. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  24. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. cold — an illness
  2. bat — the animal
  3. chair — a professorship
  4. branch — of a tree
  5. file — a line of people
  6. spell — letters
  7. branch — a division
  8. clip — for paper
  9. clip — a video
  10. branch — of a bank
  11. cold — not warm
  12. spell — a short time
  13. swing — to play on
  14. bat — in an idiom
  15. chair — a leader
  16. file — a document
  17. swing — music
  18. spell — magic
  19. bat — for baseball
  20. cold — the Cold War
  21. swing — in golf
  22. chair — to sit on
  23. clip — to cut
  24. file — a tool

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