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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. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  2. Take your time. There's no ________________.
  3. Turn up the ________________ so we can feel the beat.
  4. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  5. When I ________________ my fingers, you'll wake up.
  6. ________________ out of it! You haven't done a thing all week.
  7. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  8. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  9. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  10. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.
  11. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  12. You don't have to ________________ at me like that.
  13. The fisherman caught a huge ________________.
  14. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  15. I play ________________ in a jazz band.
  16. Winning one ________________ isn't the same as dominating a sport.
  17. Only by prohibiting all nuclear weapons, we can together stop the arms ________________.
  18. That must've been a ________________.
  19. Atomic bombs are a danger to the human ________________.
  20. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  21. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.
  22. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  23. You shouldn't ________________ things.
  24. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.

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

Answer key

  1. degree — from a university
  2. rush — hurry
  3. bass — low music
  4. hand — help
  5. snap — to click
  6. snap — to snap out of it
  7. tear — from crying
  8. prune — the fruit
  9. tear — from crying
  10. tear — to rip
  11. hand — part of the body
  12. snap — to speak sharply
  13. bass — the fish
  14. degree — an amount
  15. bass — the instrument
  16. race — a contest
  17. race — the arms race
  18. rush — a thrill
  19. race — humankind
  20. prune — to trim
  21. prune — to trim
  22. hand — in cards
  23. rush — to hurry
  24. degree — temperature

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