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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: cold · tear · branch · stem · chair · clip · wax · trunk

  1. James Baker serves as an Honorary Co-________________ for the World Justice Project.
  2. Biology is a ________________ of science.
  3. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  4. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  5. What's the best way to remove ear ________________?
  6. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  7. The tree's ________________ was scarred by lightning strikes.
  8. Many English words ________________ from Latin.
  9. Professor Sir Peter Hirsch formerly held the ________________.
  10. Scientists study ________________ cells to repair damaged tissue.
  11. Our bank has a ________________ near the station.
  12. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  13. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  14. The elephant has a huge ________________.
  15. The museum has ________________ figures of famous people.
  16. I've got the luggage in my ________________.
  17. He chopped down the ________________ with an ax.
  18. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  19. The big green plant was starting to droop at the ________________.
  20. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  21. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.
  22. The water is too ________________.
  23. The moon will ________________ and wane.
  24. I put the bag on or beside the ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. chair — a leader
  2. branch — a division
  3. tear — from crying
  4. clip — for paper
  5. wax — in the ear
  6. cold — an illness
  7. trunk — of a tree
  8. stem — to come from
  9. chair — a professorship
  10. stem — a stem cell
  11. branch — of a bank
  12. clip — to cut
  13. clip — a video
  14. trunk — of an elephant
  15. wax — for sculpting
  16. trunk — of a car
  17. branch — of a tree
  18. cold — the Cold War
  19. stem — of a plant
  20. tear — from crying
  21. tear — to rip
  22. cold — not warm
  23. wax — to grow
  24. chair — to sit on

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