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

Word bank: field · pound · cold · bat · prune · straw

  1. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  2. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  3. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  4. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  5. Rodrigo's family went to the dog ________________ to adopt a dog.
  6. It always has to be a ________________ man with them.
  7. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  8. Jeff had to ________________ the pavement for three months before he found a job.
  9. The goat rested comfortably on a soft bed of ________________.
  10. A drowning man will clutch at a ________________.
  11. The water is too ________________.
  12. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  13. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  14. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  15. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.
  16. A ________________ is equal to sixteen ounces.
  17. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  18. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.

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

Answer key

  1. bat — for baseball
  2. cold — an illness
  3. cold — the Cold War
  4. prune — the fruit
  5. pound — for dogs
  6. straw — a straw man
  7. prune — to trim
  8. pound — to hit hard
  9. straw — dry grass
  10. straw — to clutch at straws
  11. cold — not warm
  12. field — for sport
  13. field — farmland
  14. bat — the animal
  15. prune — to trim
  16. pound — a weight
  17. bat — in an idiom
  18. field — a subject

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