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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.

Make a worksheet

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. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  3. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  4. We're on a ________________ here.
  5. Turn up the ________________ so we can feel the beat.
  6. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  7. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  8. James Baker serves as an Honorary Co-________________ for the World Justice Project.
  9. I put the bag on or beside the ________________.
  10. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  11. The water is too ________________.
  12. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  13. The fisherman caught a huge ________________.
  14. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  15. Grandma has made a Swiss ________________.
  16. Professor Sir Peter Hirsch formerly held the ________________.
  17. You don't have to ________________ at me like that.
  18. I play ________________ in a jazz band.
  19. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  20. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  21. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  22. When I ________________ my fingers, you'll wake up.
  23. The teacher called the ________________ to see who was absent.
  24. ________________ out of it! You haven't done a thing all week.

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

Answer key

  1. degree — from a university
  2. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  3. clip — a video
  4. roll — on a roll
  5. bass — low music
  6. degree — temperature
  7. degree — an amount
  8. chair — a leader
  9. chair — to sit on
  10. kid — child
  11. cold — not warm
  12. cold — an illness
  13. bass — the fish
  14. kid — to tease
  15. roll — a cake
  16. chair — a professorship
  17. snap — to speak sharply
  18. bass — the instrument
  19. cold — the Cold War
  20. clip — to cut
  21. clip — for paper
  22. snap — to click
  23. roll — a list
  24. snap — to snap out of it

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