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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. The lid of the ________________ creaked open.
  2. He sold his goods at a loss to ________________ up his business.
  3. It was raining hard, and to make things worse, the ________________ was beginning to rise.
  4. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  5. The owl hooted softly from its ________________.
  6. ________________ is common in the lakes of Sweden.
  7. The birds use the scarecrow as a ________________.
  8. That was a fun ________________.
  9. I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my ________________.
  10. She laid her head on my ________________ so she could listen to my heartbeat.
  11. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  12. The goat rested comfortably on a soft bed of ________________.
  13. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  14. The strong ________________ blew his hat off.
  15. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  16. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  17. It always has to be a ________________ man with them.
  18. A drowning man will clutch at a ________________.
  19. There's a broken ________________ in the bed.
  20. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  21. The hotel is built around a mineral ________________.
  22. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  23. The flowers bloom in the ________________.
  24. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. chest — a box
  2. wind — to turn a key
  3. wind — moving air
  4. game — wild animals
  5. perch — for a bird
  6. perch — the fish
  7. perch — for a bird
  8. game — a match
  9. chest — of your body
  10. chest — of your body
  11. wound — an injury
  12. straw — dry grass
  13. wound — past of 'wind'
  14. wind — moving air
  15. shower — rain
  16. wound — an injury
  17. straw — a straw man
  18. straw — to clutch at straws
  19. spring — a coil
  20. shower — to wash
  21. spring — of water
  22. game — a kind of play
  23. spring — the season
  24. shower — a meteor shower

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