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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.

Words on the sheet
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: cold · hand · field · key · sharp · capital · kid · row

  1. The water is too ________________.
  2. I had a ________________ with my boss today.
  3. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  4. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  5. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  6. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  7. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  8. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  9. Hard work is the ________________ to success.
  10. Are you the only one who has a ________________ to this door?
  11. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  12. He's quite ________________, isn't he?
  13. It's one o'clock ________________.
  14. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  15. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  16. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  17. We had to ________________ the boat across the lake.
  18. This piece is in a major ________________.
  19. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  20. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  21. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  22. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  23. The girl drawing a picture in the first ________________ is my niece.
  24. This knife is not ________________ enough.

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

Answer key

  1. cold — not warm
  2. row — a quarrel
  3. hand — help
  4. field — a subject
  5. kid — child
  6. cold — the Cold War
  7. hand — in cards
  8. kid — to tease
  9. key — the most important part
  10. key — for a lock
  11. field — farmland
  12. sharp — clever
  13. sharp — exactly
  14. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  15. capital — a city
  16. field — for sport
  17. row — to paddle
  18. key — in music
  19. capital — a big letter
  20. capital — money
  21. cold — an illness
  22. hand — part of the body
  23. row — a line
  24. sharp — with an edge

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