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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: cell · track · bat · hand · arm · content · kid · cold

  1. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  2. My father caught me by the ________________.
  3. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  4. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  5. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!
  6. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  7. She sat on the ________________ of the sofa.
  8. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  9. The muddy ________________ descends to a valley.
  10. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  11. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  12. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  13. He was locked up in a ________________.
  14. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  15. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  16. This is my favorite ________________ on the album.
  17. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  18. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  19. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  20. He keeps ________________ of his days.
  21. The water is too ________________.
  22. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  23. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  24. I'd give my right ________________ to be ambidextrous.

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

Answer key

  1. kid — to tease
  2. arm — part of the body
  3. content — the amount
  4. cold — the Cold War
  5. cell — a phone
  6. cell — in biology
  7. arm — a part of something
  8. cold — an illness
  9. track — a path
  10. bat — the animal
  11. kid — child
  12. content — videos and posts
  13. cell — in a prison
  14. bat — in an idiom
  15. hand — help
  16. track — a song
  17. bat — for baseball
  18. hand — in cards
  19. hand — part of the body
  20. track — to keep track
  21. cold — not warm
  22. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  23. content — happy
  24. arm — part of the body

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