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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 · mark · bat · file · staff · field · stock · drill

  1. The office ________________ worked quickly and efficiently to resolve the problem.
  2. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  3. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  4. The soldiers did ________________ on the parade ground every morning.
  5. What's the difference between broth and ________________?
  6. ________________ my words: he'll be late again.
  7. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  8. The old man leaned on his ________________.
  9. The water is too ________________.
  10. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  11. It's hotel ________________. Please let me in.
  12. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  13. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  14. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  15. We had a fire ________________ at school today.
  16. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  17. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  18. I need a ________________ to install the towel rack.
  19. The hot cup left a ________________ on the table.
  20. The supermarket has a large ________________ of merchandise.
  21. The ________________ market has crashed.
  22. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  23. She got the top ________________ in the exam.
  24. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.

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

Answer key

  1. staff — employees
  2. bat — for baseball
  3. field — farmland
  4. drill — army training
  5. stock — a soup base
  6. mark — to pay attention
  7. file — a tool
  8. staff — a stick
  9. cold — not warm
  10. file — a document
  11. staff — employees
  12. bat — the animal
  13. bat — in an idiom
  14. cold — an illness
  15. drill — a practice
  16. field — for sport
  17. file — a line of people
  18. drill — the tool
  19. mark — a trace
  20. stock — goods
  21. stock — shares
  22. field — a subject
  23. mark — a grade
  24. cold — the Cold War

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