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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: clip · bat · pitch · fall · pit · game · spring · wound

  1. He who climbs up, will ________________ down.
  2. In the ________________, covers are put over the fans in trains.
  3. The pointer is employed to find upland ________________.
  4. The ________________ hangs upside down in the cave.
  5. The ________________ was stolen yesterday, along with the balls.
  6. Have you ever swallowed an apricot ________________?
  7. It's not a deep ________________. It's just a scratch.
  8. Boris sat near the fire ________________.
  9. This looks like a gunshot ________________.
  10. The hotel is built around a mineral ________________.
  11. She's preparing to ________________ her idea to the investors.
  12. My stomach aches so much that I can't ________________ asleep.
  13. We ________________ up on opposing sides.
  14. Jarno Trulli was disqualified for passing a red light at the ________________ exit.
  15. Tom didn't even ________________ an eye.
  16. Roulette is a ________________ of chance.
  17. There's a broken ________________ in the bed.
  18. The room was ________________ black, so I couldn't see a thing.
  19. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  20. The players ran onto the football ________________.
  21. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  22. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  23. That was a fun ________________.
  24. The flowers bloom in the ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. fall — to drop
  2. fall — the season
  3. game — wild animals
  4. bat — the animal
  5. bat — for baseball
  6. pit — a fruit stone
  7. wound — an injury
  8. pit — a hole
  9. wound — an injury
  10. spring — of water
  11. pitch — a sales talk
  12. fall — to drop
  13. wound — past of 'wind'
  14. pit — in a race
  15. bat — in an idiom
  16. game — a kind of play
  17. spring — a coil
  18. pitch — completely
  19. clip — to cut
  20. pitch — a sports field
  21. clip — for paper
  22. clip — a video
  23. game — a match
  24. spring — the season

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