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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 120 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: straw · mine · ball · cold · degree · rush · staff · scale

  1. The water is too ________________.
  2. It's hotel ________________. Please let me in.
  3. It always has to be a ________________ man with them.
  4. Every pianist practices the C major ________________.
  5. You shouldn't ________________ things.
  6. He was blown up by a land ________________.
  7. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.
  8. Take your time. There's no ________________.
  9. The goat rested comfortably on a soft bed of ________________.
  10. The King held a masked ________________.
  11. The old man leaned on his ________________.
  12. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  13. Nobody expected a disaster on this ________________.
  14. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  15. The office ________________ worked quickly and efficiently to resolve the problem.
  16. That must've been a ________________.
  17. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  18. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  19. I was having a ________________ recording these guys.
  20. A drowning man will clutch at a ________________.
  21. The kitchen ________________ is next to the microwave.
  22. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  23. The kitten curled into a ________________.
  24. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.

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

Answer key

  1. cold — not warm
  2. staff — employees
  3. straw — a straw man
  4. scale — in music
  5. rush — to hurry
  6. mine — an explosive
  7. mine — belonging to me
  8. rush — hurry
  9. straw — dry grass
  10. ball — a dance
  11. staff — a stick
  12. degree — an amount
  13. scale — size or range
  14. cold — an illness
  15. staff — employees
  16. rush — a thrill
  17. cold — the Cold War
  18. degree — temperature
  19. ball — a great time
  20. straw — to clutch at straws
  21. scale — for weighing
  22. mine — for digging
  23. ball — a round shape
  24. degree — from a university

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