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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. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  2. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  3. She laid her head on my ________________ so she could listen to my heartbeat.
  4. Professor Sir Peter Hirsch formerly held the ________________.
  5. The soldiers did ________________ on the parade ground every morning.
  6. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  7. I need a ________________ to install the towel rack.
  8. The lid of the ________________ creaked open.
  9. James Baker serves as an Honorary Co-________________ for the World Justice Project.
  10. He sold his goods at a loss to ________________ up his business.
  11. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  12. When are we going to ________________?
  13. That was a fun ________________.
  14. We had a fire ________________ at school today.
  15. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  16. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  17. I put the bag on or beside the ________________.
  18. It was raining hard, and to make things worse, the ________________ was beginning to rise.
  19. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  20. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  21. I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my ________________.
  22. The strong ________________ blew his hat off.
  23. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  24. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. game — a kind of play
  2. land — ground
  3. chest — of your body
  4. chair — a professorship
  5. drill — army training
  6. content — the amount
  7. drill — the tool
  8. chest — a box
  9. chair — a leader
  10. wind — to turn a key
  11. file — a document
  12. land — to come down
  13. game — a match
  14. drill — a practice
  15. game — wild animals
  16. file — a tool
  17. chair — to sit on
  18. wind — moving air
  19. content — happy
  20. content — videos and posts
  21. chest — of your body
  22. wind — moving air
  23. land — a country
  24. file — a line of people

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