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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: bark · mug · hand · content · chip · clip · spring · field

  1. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  2. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  3. The flowers bloom in the ________________.
  4. Algeria has become a bargaining ________________ in a global game of poker.
  5. Birch trees have smooth white ________________.
  6. Is that Pat Hanrahan's ________________ looking hungry and willing.
  7. There's a broken ________________ in the bed.
  8. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  9. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  10. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  11. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  12. He refilled his coffee ________________.
  13. The sergeant loved to ________________ orders at us.
  14. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  15. Where did you ________________ them?
  16. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  17. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  18. There's a computer ________________ on the table.
  19. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  20. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  21. The potato ________________ was salty and crunchy.
  22. The hotel is built around a mineral ________________.
  23. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  24. Our dog starts to ________________ whenever the doorbell rings.

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

Answer key

  1. content — happy
  2. clip — a video
  3. spring — the season
  4. chip — for betting
  5. bark — of a tree
  6. mug — a face
  7. spring — a coil
  8. clip — for paper
  9. hand — part of the body
  10. field — for sport
  11. field — a subject
  12. mug — a cup
  13. bark — to shout
  14. content — the amount
  15. mug — to rob
  16. hand — in cards
  17. field — farmland
  18. chip — in a computer
  19. hand — help
  20. content — videos and posts
  21. chip — to eat
  22. spring — of water
  23. clip — to cut
  24. bark — a dog's sound

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