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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 116 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: rush · file · capital · kid · hand · mine · last · patient

  1. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  2. We've got to handle this with ________________ gloves.
  3. Don't ________________ yourself. You couldn't afford to buy a house like this.
  4. I had chicken pox when I was a ________________.
  5. I got dealt a bad ________________.
  6. Take your time. There's no ________________.
  7. At ________________, we arrived at the village.
  8. I met an old friend of ________________ the other day.
  9. He hasn't even shaken my ________________.
  10. You shouldn't ________________ things.
  11. She's sitting on a gold ________________.
  12. Today is the ________________ day of the holidays. Back to school tomorrow!
  13. That must've been a ________________.
  14. He rubbed the rust off with a ________________.
  15. The farmer was ________________ with the unruly horse.
  16. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  17. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  18. False peace will not ________________.
  19. Do you need a ________________ with that?
  20. The information is stored in a ________________ on my computer.
  21. The nurse administered an injection to the ________________.
  22. We walked down the narrow path in single ________________.
  23. The ________________ was transferred to the cardiology ward.
  24. He was blown up by a land ________________.

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

Answer key

  1. capital — a city
  2. kid — young goat (kid gloves)
  3. kid — to tease
  4. kid — child
  5. hand — in cards
  6. rush — hurry
  7. last — finally
  8. mine — belonging to me
  9. hand — part of the body
  10. rush — to hurry
  11. mine — for digging
  12. last — final
  13. rush — a thrill
  14. file — a tool
  15. patient — calm and waiting
  16. capital — a big letter
  17. capital — money
  18. last — to go on
  19. hand — help
  20. file — a document
  21. patient — a sick person
  22. file — a line of people
  23. patient — a sick person
  24. mine — an explosive

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