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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. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  2. Birch trees have smooth white ________________.
  3. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  4. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  5. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  6. Michael Jackson and Prince changed the history of ________________ music.
  7. Our bedroom windows ________________ the sea.
  8. Sooner or later you'll have to ________________ the truth.
  9. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  10. Our dog starts to ________________ whenever the doorbell rings.
  11. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  12. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  13. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  14. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  15. Did you ________________ the meat?
  16. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  17. The sergeant loved to ________________ orders at us.
  18. She had a strange look on her ________________.
  19. We're almost out of ________________.
  20. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  21. You don't need to ________________ round.
  22. They retained the League and Cup in his second ________________.
  23. Spring is a pleasant ________________.
  24. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.

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

Answer key

  1. content — happy
  2. bark — of a tree
  3. content — the amount
  4. wound — an injury
  5. kid — to tease
  6. pop — music
  7. face — to point toward
  8. face — to confront
  9. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  10. bark — a dog's sound
  11. wound — past of 'wind'
  12. tear — from crying
  13. content — videos and posts
  14. tear — from crying
  15. season — to add flavour
  16. wound — an injury
  17. bark — to shout
  18. face — part of the head
  19. pop — soda
  20. kid — child
  21. pop — to visit
  22. season — in sport
  23. season — of the year
  24. tear — to rip

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