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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: fork · march · cell · pitch · degree · date · cold · row

  1. I had a ________________ with my boss today.
  2. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  3. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  4. Why do cosmetics have an expiration ________________?
  5. The players ran onto the football ________________.
  6. The girl drawing a picture in the first ________________ is my niece.
  7. We usually eat with a knife, ________________ and spoon.
  8. Have you settled on a ________________?
  9. She's preparing to ________________ her idea to the investors.
  10. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  11. His birthday is in either ________________ or April.
  12. The water is too ________________.
  13. We had to ________________ the boat across the lake.
  14. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  15. We will have lived in Kyoto for eight years next ________________.
  16. He was locked up in a ________________.
  17. The band played a military ________________ at the parade.
  18. A ________________ is a sweet brown fruit from a palm tree.
  19. Use a garden ________________ to turn the soil.
  20. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!
  21. We came to a ________________ in the road and had no idea which direction to go.
  22. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  23. The room was ________________ black, so I couldn't see a thing.
  24. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.

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

Answer key

  1. row — a quarrel
  2. cell — in biology
  3. degree — from a university
  4. date — on the calendar
  5. pitch — a sports field
  6. row — a line
  7. fork — to eat with
  8. date — on the calendar
  9. pitch — a sales talk
  10. degree — an amount
  11. march — the month
  12. cold — not warm
  13. row — to paddle
  14. cold — the Cold War
  15. march — the month
  16. cell — in a prison
  17. march — music
  18. date — the fruit
  19. fork — a garden tool
  20. cell — a phone
  21. fork — in a road
  22. cold — an illness
  23. pitch — completely
  24. degree — temperature

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