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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. One ________________ from a giraffe's hind leg is enough to kill a lion.
  2. I get a ________________ out of her cheerful personality.
  3. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  4. The room was ________________ black, so I couldn't see a thing.
  5. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  6. He took the fish out of the ________________.
  7. My rich neighbors belong to a private golf ________________.
  8. The water is too ________________.
  9. The ball hit the back of the ________________.
  10. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  11. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  12. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  13. That was a fun ________________.
  14. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  15. They were given a penalty ________________ just minutes from the end.
  16. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  17. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  18. Later, his shop becomes a ________________ with young dancers.
  19. What was your ________________ profit last year?
  20. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  21. She's preparing to ________________ her idea to the investors.
  22. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  23. The players ran onto the football ________________.
  24. I belonged to the harmonica ________________ in my high school days.

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

Answer key

  1. kick — with a leg
  2. kick — a thrill
  3. clip — to cut
  4. pitch — completely
  5. bat — for baseball
  6. net — for catching
  7. club — for golf
  8. cold — not warm
  9. net — in sport
  10. clip — for paper
  11. clip — a video
  12. game — a kind of play
  13. game — a match
  14. cold — the Cold War
  15. kick — in football
  16. cold — an illness
  17. bat — the animal
  18. club — for dancing
  19. net — after costs
  20. game — wild animals
  21. pitch — a sales talk
  22. bat — in an idiom
  23. pitch — a sports field
  24. club — a group

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