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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. Add some ________________ pepper to it.
  2. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  3. The girl drawing a picture in the first ________________ is my niece.
  4. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  5. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  6. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  7. The supermarket has a large ________________ of merchandise.
  8. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  9. What's the difference between broth and ________________?
  10. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  11. The owl hooted softly from its ________________.
  12. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  13. The ________________ was covered with snow, as far as the eye could see.
  14. ________________ is common in the lakes of Sweden.
  15. I had a ________________ with my boss today.
  16. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  17. The birds use the scarecrow as a ________________.
  18. That was a fun ________________.
  19. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  20. We had to ________________ the boat across the lake.
  21. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.
  22. There's no middle ________________.
  23. The ________________ market has crashed.
  24. I got dealt a bad ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. ground — crushed
  2. shower — to wash
  3. row — a line
  4. game — wild animals
  5. hand — help
  6. game — a kind of play
  7. stock — goods
  8. degree — an amount
  9. stock — a soup base
  10. hand — part of the body
  11. perch — for a bird
  12. degree — from a university
  13. ground — the earth
  14. perch — the fish
  15. row — a quarrel
  16. degree — temperature
  17. perch — for a bird
  18. game — a match
  19. shower — rain
  20. row — to paddle
  21. shower — a meteor shower
  22. ground — a position
  23. stock — shares
  24. hand — in cards

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