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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 116 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. The girl drawing a picture in the first ________________ is my niece.
  3. There's no middle ________________.
  4. The King held a masked ________________.
  5. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  6. The museum has ________________ figures of famous people.
  7. The moon will ________________ and wane.
  8. I was having a ________________ recording these guys.
  9. When are we going to ________________?
  10. The ________________ was so hot, it burned my tongue.
  11. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  12. We had to ________________ the boat across the lake.
  13. What's the best way to remove ear ________________?
  14. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  15. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  16. I had a ________________ with my boss today.
  17. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  18. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  19. The kitten curled into a ________________.
  20. They watched the sun ________________ below the horizon.
  21. I like to ________________ a cookie in coffee.
  22. The ________________ was covered with snow, as far as the eye could see.
  23. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  24. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.

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

Answer key

  1. ground — crushed
  2. row — a line
  3. ground — a position
  4. ball — a dance
  5. bat — the animal
  6. wax — for sculpting
  7. wax — to grow
  8. ball — a great time
  9. land — to come down
  10. dip — a sauce
  11. land — ground
  12. row — to paddle
  13. wax — in the ear
  14. clip — for paper
  15. bat — for baseball
  16. row — a quarrel
  17. bat — in an idiom
  18. clip — to cut
  19. ball — a round shape
  20. dip — to sink
  21. dip — to dunk
  22. ground — the earth
  23. clip — a video
  24. land — a country

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