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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 116 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 play ________________ in a jazz band.
  2. We're almost out of ________________.
  3. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  4. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  5. The fisherman caught a huge ________________.
  6. We had a fire ________________ at school today.
  7. The soldiers did ________________ on the parade ground every morning.
  8. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  9. The ball is in your ________________.
  10. I need a ________________ to install the towel rack.
  11. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  12. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  13. When are we going to ________________?
  14. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  15. You don't need to ________________ round.
  16. Our bedroom windows ________________ the sea.
  17. Sooner or later you'll have to ________________ the truth.
  18. Turn up the ________________ so we can feel the beat.
  19. The water is too ________________.
  20. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  21. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  22. She had a strange look on her ________________.
  23. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  24. Michael Jackson and Prince changed the history of ________________ music.

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

Answer key

  1. bass — the instrument
  2. pop — soda
  3. capital — a big letter
  4. court — of a king
  5. bass — the fish
  6. drill — a practice
  7. drill — army training
  8. court — of law
  9. court — for sport
  10. drill — the tool
  11. cold — the Cold War
  12. cold — an illness
  13. land — to come down
  14. land — ground
  15. pop — to visit
  16. face — to point toward
  17. face — to confront
  18. bass — low music
  19. cold — not warm
  20. capital — a city
  21. land — a country
  22. face — part of the head
  23. capital — money
  24. pop — music

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