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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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468
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: content · row · scale · bat · mate · mine · spring · hand

  1. Have you found your soul ________________?
  2. There's a broken ________________ in the bed.
  3. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  4. Every pianist practices the C major ________________.
  5. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  6. Nobody expected a disaster on this ________________.
  7. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  8. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  9. The flowers bloom in the ________________.
  10. Males and females first ________________ when two years old.
  11. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.
  12. The kitchen ________________ is next to the microwave.
  13. The girl drawing a picture in the first ________________ is my niece.
  14. I had a ________________ with my boss today.
  15. Excuse me, sorry ________________, you haven't got the time have you?
  16. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  17. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  18. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  19. The hotel is built around a mineral ________________.
  20. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  21. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  22. He was blown up by a land ________________.
  23. We had to ________________ the boat across the lake.
  24. I got dealt a bad ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. mate — a partner
  2. spring — a coil
  3. bat — for baseball
  4. scale — in music
  5. content — videos and posts
  6. scale — size or range
  7. content — the amount
  8. bat — the animal
  9. spring — the season
  10. mate — to breed
  11. mine — belonging to me
  12. scale — for weighing
  13. row — a line
  14. row — a quarrel
  15. mate — a friend
  16. mine — for digging
  17. hand — part of the body
  18. bat — in an idiom
  19. spring — of water
  20. content — happy
  21. hand — help
  22. mine — an explosive
  23. row — to paddle
  24. hand — in cards

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