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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. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  2. Michael Jackson and Prince changed the history of ________________ music.
  3. We're almost out of ________________.
  4. When I ________________ my fingers, you'll wake up.
  5. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  6. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  7. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  8. She had a strange look on her ________________.
  9. He was locked up in a ________________.
  10. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  11. Our bedroom windows ________________ the sea.
  12. You don't need to ________________ round.
  13. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!
  14. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  15. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  16. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  17. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  18. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  19. ________________ out of it! You haven't done a thing all week.
  20. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  21. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  22. Sooner or later you'll have to ________________ the truth.
  23. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  24. You don't have to ________________ at me like that.

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

Answer key

  1. degree — temperature
  2. pop — music
  3. pop — soda
  4. snap — to click
  5. capital — a big letter
  6. file — a tool
  7. capital — a city
  8. face — part of the head
  9. cell — in a prison
  10. wound — an injury
  11. face — to point toward
  12. pop — to visit
  13. cell — a phone
  14. capital — money
  15. file — a document
  16. wound — past of 'wind'
  17. wound — an injury
  18. cell — in biology
  19. snap — to snap out of it
  20. degree — an amount
  21. file — a line of people
  22. face — to confront
  23. degree — from a university
  24. snap — to speak sharply

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