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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. He felt the sting of the whip's ________________.
  2. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  3. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  4. Speak softly and carry a big ________________.
  5. Don't ________________ out at me just because you're upset.
  6. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  7. Fiction is obliged to ________________ to possibilities. Truth isn't.
  8. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  9. This is the first time I've ever walked with a ________________.
  10. The goat rested comfortably on a soft bed of ________________.
  11. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  12. The spa offers ________________ extensions.
  13. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!
  14. That was a fun ________________.
  15. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  16. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  17. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  18. A drowning man will clutch at a ________________.
  19. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  20. He was locked up in a ________________.
  21. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  22. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  23. It always has to be a ________________ man with them.
  24. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. lash — a whip stroke
  2. game — a kind of play
  3. degree — an amount
  4. stick — a piece of wood
  5. lash — to lash out
  6. degree — from a university
  7. stick — to attach or keep to
  8. bat — in an idiom
  9. stick — a piece of wood
  10. straw — dry grass
  11. bat — for baseball
  12. lash — an eyelash
  13. cell — a phone
  14. game — a match
  15. degree — temperature
  16. cell — in biology
  17. bat — the animal
  18. straw — to clutch at straws
  19. kid — to tease
  20. cell — in a prison
  21. game — wild animals
  22. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  23. straw — a straw man
  24. kid — child

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