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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. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  2. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  3. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.
  4. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  5. He asked the witch to reverse the ________________.
  6. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  7. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  8. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  9. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  10. Did you ________________ the button?
  11. We've had a long dry ________________ this summer.
  12. The players ran onto the football ________________.
  13. How do you ________________ your surname?
  14. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  15. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  16. He was blown up by a land ________________.
  17. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  18. The room was ________________ black, so I couldn't see a thing.
  19. Manchester University ________________ is the university's academic publishing house.
  20. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.
  21. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  22. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  23. She's preparing to ________________ her idea to the investors.
  24. The function of the ________________ is to provide the common people with facts.

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

Answer key

  1. mine — for digging
  2. hand — in cards
  3. mine — belonging to me
  4. hand — help
  5. spell — magic
  6. kid — to tease
  7. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  8. capital — a big letter
  9. kid — child
  10. press — to push
  11. spell — a short time
  12. pitch — a sports field
  13. spell — letters
  14. tear — from crying
  15. capital — a city
  16. mine — an explosive
  17. capital — money
  18. pitch — completely
  19. press — a publisher
  20. tear — to rip
  21. hand — part of the body
  22. tear — from crying
  23. pitch — a sales talk
  24. press — newspapers

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