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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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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: bat · court · land · degree · patient · net · swing · ground

  1. In jazz, ________________ was gradually being replaced by bebop.
  2. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  3. The ball is in your ________________.
  4. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  5. There's no middle ________________.
  6. Algeria is a ________________ of gas and oil.
  7. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  8. He took the fish out of the ________________.
  9. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  10. The ________________ was covered with snow, as far as the eye could see.
  11. David sat on the ________________.
  12. I'm the one who owns all this ________________.
  13. Add some ________________ pepper to it.
  14. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  15. The coach helped Matthew straighten out his golf ________________, improving his game.
  16. The ball hit the back of the ________________.
  17. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  18. The ________________ was transferred to the cardiology ward.
  19. What was your ________________ profit last year?
  20. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  21. When are we going to ________________?
  22. The nurse administered an injection to the ________________.
  23. The farmer was ________________ with the unruly horse.
  24. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.

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

Answer key

  1. swing — music
  2. bat — the animal
  3. court — for sport
  4. degree — from a university
  5. ground — a position
  6. land — a country
  7. degree — an amount
  8. net — for catching
  9. court — of law
  10. ground — the earth
  11. swing — to play on
  12. land — ground
  13. ground — crushed
  14. court — of a king
  15. swing — in golf
  16. net — in sport
  17. bat — in an idiom
  18. patient — a sick person
  19. net — after costs
  20. degree — temperature
  21. land — to come down
  22. patient — a sick person
  23. patient — calm and waiting
  24. bat — for baseball

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