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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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Word bank
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Multiple-Meaning Words

Name: ____________________Date: __________

Write the missing word from the word bank in each sentence. Each word is used more than once, with a different meaning each time.

Word bank: cold · clip · dip · net · trunk · date

  1. The water is too ________________.
  2. The ________________ was so hot, it burned my tongue.
  3. A ________________ is a sweet brown fruit from a palm tree.
  4. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  5. The tree's ________________ was scarred by lightning strikes.
  6. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  7. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  8. He took the fish out of the ________________.
  9. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  10. The ball hit the back of the ________________.
  11. Why do cosmetics have an expiration ________________?
  12. Have you settled on a ________________?
  13. The elephant has a huge ________________.
  14. I've got the luggage in my ________________.
  15. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  16. What was your ________________ profit last year?
  17. I like to ________________ a cookie in coffee.
  18. They watched the sun ________________ below the horizon.

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

Answer key

  1. cold — not warm
  2. dip — a sauce
  3. date — the fruit
  4. clip — for paper
  5. trunk — of a tree
  6. cold — an illness
  7. clip — a video
  8. net — for catching
  9. clip — to cut
  10. net — in sport
  11. date — on the calendar
  12. date — on the calendar
  13. trunk — of an elephant
  14. trunk — of a car
  15. cold — the Cold War
  16. net — after costs
  17. dip — to dunk
  18. dip — to sink

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