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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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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: chest · bear · stock · capital · ground · band · face · degree

  1. Our bedroom windows ________________ the sea.
  2. I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my ________________.
  3. In my city, the temperature is one ________________ above zero.
  4. Add some ________________ pepper to it.
  5. A black ________________ roamed the forest.
  6. He's the lead singer in a rock ________________.
  7. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  8. He put a rubber ________________ around the bundle of letters.
  9. There's no middle ________________.
  10. The supermarket has a large ________________ of merchandise.
  11. What's the difference between broth and ________________?
  12. The ________________ market has crashed.
  13. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  14. The little girl was crying for the teddy ________________.
  15. The lid of the ________________ creaked open.
  16. He still wears his gold wedding ________________.
  17. Sooner or later you'll have to ________________ the truth.
  18. The ________________ was covered with snow, as far as the eye could see.
  19. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  20. A university ________________ is the ticket to a successful career.
  21. She had a strange look on her ________________.
  22. To what ________________ are you interested in baseball?
  23. She laid her head on my ________________ so she could listen to my heartbeat.
  24. Many happy returns to all who ________________ the name of a flower!

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

Answer key

  1. face — to point toward
  2. chest — of your body
  3. degree — temperature
  4. ground — crushed
  5. bear — the animal
  6. band — a music group
  7. capital — a big letter
  8. band — a rubber band
  9. ground — a position
  10. stock — goods
  11. stock — a soup base
  12. stock — shares
  13. capital — money
  14. bear — the animal
  15. chest — a box
  16. band — a ring
  17. face — to confront
  18. ground — the earth
  19. capital — a city
  20. degree — from a university
  21. face — part of the head
  22. degree — an amount
  23. chest — of your body
  24. bear — to put up with

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