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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 116 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 · swing · bat · race · wound · mark · land · object

  1. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  2. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  3. Only by prohibiting all nuclear weapons, we can together stop the arms ________________.
  4. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  5. A valuable ________________ decreases in value if it is damaged.
  6. Winning one ________________ isn't the same as dominating a sport.
  7. ________________ my words: he'll be late again.
  8. Atomic bombs are a danger to the human ________________.
  9. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  10. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  11. The water is too ________________.
  12. She got the top ________________ in the exam.
  13. In jazz, ________________ was gradually being replaced by bebop.
  14. The coach helped Matthew straighten out his golf ________________, improving his game.
  15. When are we going to ________________?
  16. David sat on the ________________.
  17. The hot cup left a ________________ on the table.
  18. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  19. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  20. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  21. Why would I ________________ to a disabled ramp?
  22. Thanks to his efforts, he attained his ________________.
  23. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  24. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.

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

Answer key

  1. land — ground
  2. cold — the Cold War
  3. race — the arms race
  4. land — a country
  5. object — a thing
  6. race — a contest
  7. mark — to pay attention
  8. race — humankind
  9. wound — an injury
  10. wound — past of 'wind'
  11. cold — not warm
  12. mark — a grade
  13. swing — music
  14. swing — in golf
  15. land — to come down
  16. swing — to play on
  17. mark — a trace
  18. wound — an injury
  19. bat — for baseball
  20. cold — an illness
  21. object — to protest
  22. object — an aim
  23. bat — in an idiom
  24. bat — the animal

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