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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. How do you ________________ your surname?
  2. He asked the witch to reverse the ________________.
  3. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  4. Rodrigo's family went to the dog ________________ to adopt a dog.
  5. Don't ________________ out at me just because you're upset.
  6. A ________________ is equal to sixteen ounces.
  7. The spa offers ________________ extensions.
  8. We've had a long dry ________________ this summer.
  9. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  10. When I ________________ my fingers, you'll wake up.
  11. ________________ out of it! You haven't done a thing all week.
  12. Jeff had to ________________ the pavement for three months before he found a job.
  13. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  14. He felt the sting of the whip's ________________.
  15. That was a fun ________________.
  16. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  17. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  18. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  19. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  20. You don't have to ________________ at me like that.
  21. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  22. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  23. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  24. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. spell — letters
  2. spell — magic
  3. game — a kind of play
  4. pound — for dogs
  5. lash — to lash out
  6. pound — a weight
  7. lash — an eyelash
  8. spell — a short time
  9. clip — to cut
  10. snap — to click
  11. snap — to snap out of it
  12. pound — to hit hard
  13. shower — rain
  14. lash — a whip stroke
  15. game — a match
  16. file — a tool
  17. shower — to wash
  18. clip — for paper
  19. clip — a video
  20. snap — to speak sharply
  21. file — a line of people
  22. file — a document
  23. game — wild animals
  24. shower — a meteor shower

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