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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: clip · last · cold · craft · patient · mate · degree · band

  1. Today is the ________________ day of the holidays. Back to school tomorrow!
  2. He put a rubber ________________ around the bundle of letters.
  3. He still wears his gold wedding ________________.
  4. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  5. The nurse administered an injection to the ________________.
  6. Small ________________ should stay in the harbor during the storm.
  7. He spent years learning his ________________ as a carpenter.
  8. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  9. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  10. The water is too ________________.
  11. Excuse me, sorry ________________, you haven't got the time have you?
  12. The farmer was ________________ with the unruly horse.
  13. He's the lead singer in a rock ________________.
  14. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  15. Males and females first ________________ when two years old.
  16. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  17. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  18. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  19. The ________________ was transferred to the cardiology ward.
  20. Flower arranging is a traditional ________________ in Japan.
  21. Have you found your soul ________________?
  22. False peace will not ________________.
  23. At ________________, we arrived at the village.
  24. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.

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

Answer key

  1. last — final
  2. band — a rubber band
  3. band — a ring
  4. degree — temperature
  5. patient — a sick person
  6. craft — boats
  7. craft — a skill
  8. clip — a video
  9. cold — the Cold War
  10. cold — not warm
  11. mate — a friend
  12. patient — calm and waiting
  13. band — a music group
  14. degree — an amount
  15. mate — to breed
  16. clip — to cut
  17. cold — an illness
  18. clip — for paper
  19. patient — a sick person
  20. craft — a handicraft
  21. mate — a partner
  22. last — to go on
  23. last — finally
  24. degree — from a university

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