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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: mine · bass · clip · date · wake · cold · fall · sharp

  1. My stomach aches so much that I can't ________________ asleep.
  2. Why do cosmetics have an expiration ________________?
  3. The fisherman caught a huge ________________.
  4. He who climbs up, will ________________ down.
  5. I play ________________ in a jazz band.
  6. He's quite ________________, isn't he?
  7. He was blown up by a land ________________.
  8. The water is too ________________.
  9. This knife is not ________________ enough.
  10. It's one o'clock ________________.
  11. A ________________ is a sweet brown fruit from a palm tree.
  12. I didn't ________________ up well this morning.
  13. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.
  14. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  15. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  16. Have you settled on a ________________?
  17. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  18. Turn up the ________________ so we can feel the beat.
  19. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  20. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  21. Friends gathered at the ________________ to remember him.
  22. In the ________________, covers are put over the fans in trains.
  23. The speedboat left a long ________________ behind it.
  24. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.

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

Answer key

  1. fall — to drop
  2. date — on the calendar
  3. bass — the fish
  4. fall — to drop
  5. bass — the instrument
  6. sharp — clever
  7. mine — an explosive
  8. cold — not warm
  9. sharp — with an edge
  10. sharp — exactly
  11. date — the fruit
  12. wake — to stop sleeping
  13. mine — belonging to me
  14. clip — for paper
  15. cold — the Cold War
  16. date — on the calendar
  17. mine — for digging
  18. bass — low music
  19. clip — a video
  20. cold — an illness
  21. wake — before a funeral
  22. fall — the season
  23. wake — a trail
  24. clip — to cut

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