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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. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  2. ________________ my words: he'll be late again.
  3. He asked the witch to reverse the ________________.
  4. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  5. The elephant has a huge ________________.
  6. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  7. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  8. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  9. How do you ________________ your surname?
  10. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  11. The moon will ________________ and wane.
  12. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  13. When are we going to ________________?
  14. The hot cup left a ________________ on the table.
  15. She got the top ________________ in the exam.
  16. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  17. The museum has ________________ figures of famous people.
  18. The water is too ________________.
  19. What's the best way to remove ear ________________?
  20. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  21. The tree's ________________ was scarred by lightning strikes.
  22. We've had a long dry ________________ this summer.
  23. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.
  24. I've got the luggage in my ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. degree — from a university
  2. mark — to pay attention
  3. spell — magic
  4. land — ground
  5. trunk — of an elephant
  6. cold — an illness
  7. degree — temperature
  8. prune — to trim
  9. spell — letters
  10. prune — the fruit
  11. wax — to grow
  12. degree — an amount
  13. land — to come down
  14. mark — a trace
  15. mark — a grade
  16. land — a country
  17. wax — for sculpting
  18. cold — not warm
  19. wax — in the ear
  20. cold — the Cold War
  21. trunk — of a tree
  22. spell — a short time
  23. prune — to trim
  24. trunk — of a car

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