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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: clip · pound · degree · craft · field · chest · nail · race

  1. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  2. I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my ________________.
  3. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  4. He drove in a ________________ with his hammer.
  5. A ________________ is equal to sixteen ounces.
  6. Jeff had to ________________ the pavement for three months before he found a job.
  7. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  8. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  9. The ________________ went through the wall.
  10. Rodrigo's family went to the dog ________________ to adopt a dog.
  11. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  12. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  13. Atomic bombs are a danger to the human ________________.
  14. Winning one ________________ isn't the same as dominating a sport.
  15. Only by prohibiting all nuclear weapons, we can together stop the arms ________________.
  16. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  17. Small ________________ should stay in the harbor during the storm.
  18. She laid her head on my ________________ so she could listen to my heartbeat.
  19. She broke her ________________ while washing the dishes.
  20. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  21. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  22. Flower arranging is a traditional ________________ in Japan.
  23. He spent years learning his ________________ as a carpenter.
  24. The lid of the ________________ creaked open.

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

Answer key

  1. field — farmland
  2. chest — of your body
  3. clip — to cut
  4. nail — for a hammer
  5. pound — a weight
  6. pound — to hit hard
  7. field — for sport
  8. degree — temperature
  9. nail — for a hammer
  10. pound — for dogs
  11. field — a subject
  12. clip — for paper
  13. race — humankind
  14. race — a contest
  15. race — the arms race
  16. clip — a video
  17. craft — boats
  18. chest — of your body
  19. nail — on a finger
  20. degree — from a university
  21. degree — an amount
  22. craft — a handicraft
  23. craft — a skill
  24. chest — a box

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