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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: wind · cold · content · object · field · snap · spring · race

  1. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  2. The hotel is built around a mineral ________________.
  3. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  4. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  5. It was raining hard, and to make things worse, the ________________ was beginning to rise.
  6. You don't have to ________________ at me like that.
  7. Why would I ________________ to a disabled ramp?
  8. Atomic bombs are a danger to the human ________________.
  9. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  10. The water is too ________________.
  11. The strong ________________ blew his hat off.
  12. Only by prohibiting all nuclear weapons, we can together stop the arms ________________.
  13. When I ________________ my fingers, you'll wake up.
  14. Winning one ________________ isn't the same as dominating a sport.
  15. A valuable ________________ decreases in value if it is damaged.
  16. He sold his goods at a loss to ________________ up his business.
  17. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  18. The flowers bloom in the ________________.
  19. Thanks to his efforts, he attained his ________________.
  20. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  21. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  22. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  23. ________________ out of it! You haven't done a thing all week.
  24. There's a broken ________________ in the bed.

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

Answer key

  1. field — for sport
  2. spring — of water
  3. content — happy
  4. cold — the Cold War
  5. wind — moving air
  6. snap — to speak sharply
  7. object — to protest
  8. race — humankind
  9. content — the amount
  10. cold — not warm
  11. wind — moving air
  12. race — the arms race
  13. snap — to click
  14. race — a contest
  15. object — a thing
  16. wind — to turn a key
  17. field — a subject
  18. spring — the season
  19. object — an aim
  20. cold — an illness
  21. content — videos and posts
  22. field — farmland
  23. snap — to snap out of it
  24. spring — a coil

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