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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: wound · capital · clip · chair · cell · march · court · toast

  1. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  2. James Baker serves as an Honorary Co-________________ for the World Justice Project.
  3. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  4. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  5. I would like to propose a ________________ on your birthday.
  6. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  7. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  8. I put the bag on or beside the ________________.
  9. After the show, she was the ________________ of the town.
  10. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!
  11. He was locked up in a ________________.
  12. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  13. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  14. We will have lived in Kyoto for eight years next ________________.
  15. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  16. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  17. The band played a military ________________ at the parade.
  18. His birthday is in either ________________ or April.
  19. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  20. I like lots of butter on my ________________ in the morning.
  21. The ball is in your ________________.
  22. Professor Sir Peter Hirsch formerly held the ________________.
  23. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  24. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. wound — past of 'wind'
  2. chair — a leader
  3. clip — a video
  4. capital — a city
  5. toast — a drink to someone
  6. clip — for paper
  7. court — of a king
  8. chair — to sit on
  9. toast — the most admired
  10. cell — a phone
  11. cell — in a prison
  12. capital — a big letter
  13. clip — to cut
  14. march — the month
  15. wound — an injury
  16. court — of law
  17. march — music
  18. march — the month
  19. wound — an injury
  20. toast — bread
  21. court — for sport
  22. chair — a professorship
  23. cell — in biology
  24. capital — money

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