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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. The players ran onto the football ________________.
  2. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  3. The party suffered for the ________________ of party-switching.
  4. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  5. I seem to be developing a ________________.
  6. The room was ________________ black, so I couldn't see a thing.
  7. Did you ________________ the button?
  8. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  9. She's preparing to ________________ her idea to the investors.
  10. The water is too ________________.
  11. The ball hit the back of the ________________.
  12. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  13. What was your ________________ profit last year?
  14. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  15. He took the fish out of the ________________.
  16. Don't do anything ________________.
  17. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  18. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  19. Manchester University ________________ is the university's academic publishing house.
  20. The function of the ________________ is to provide the common people with facts.
  21. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  22. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.
  23. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  24. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.

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

Answer key

  1. pitch — a sports field
  2. cold — an illness
  3. rash — a series
  4. bat — in an idiom
  5. rash — on the skin
  6. pitch — completely
  7. press — to push
  8. bat — for baseball
  9. pitch — a sales talk
  10. cold — not warm
  11. net — in sport
  12. shower — to wash
  13. net — after costs
  14. capital — a city
  15. net — for catching
  16. rash — hasty
  17. bat — the animal
  18. cold — the Cold War
  19. press — a publisher
  20. press — newspapers
  21. capital — money
  22. shower — a meteor shower
  23. shower — rain
  24. capital — a big letter

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