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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 120 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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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: prune · face · content · wind · cold · bark · tear · spring

  1. Our dog starts to ________________ whenever the doorbell rings.
  2. Our bedroom windows ________________ the sea.
  3. A ________________ is just a dried plum.
  4. Birch trees have smooth white ________________.
  5. She had a strange look on her ________________.
  6. Sooner or later you'll have to ________________ the truth.
  7. TikTok makes it very easy to create ________________.
  8. Do not ________________ roses in the fall.
  9. The sergeant loved to ________________ orders at us.
  10. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  11. It is only in accepting others that we can ________________ down our own barriers.
  12. Drying a ________________ is more honorable than shedding torrents of blood.
  13. The strong ________________ blew his hat off.
  14. I cannot ________________ this tree. It's too high.
  15. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  16. The water is too ________________.
  17. I cannot shed a ________________ for that horrible man.
  18. He sold his goods at a loss to ________________ up his business.
  19. The hotel is built around a mineral ________________.
  20. Check the label for the sugar ________________.
  21. It was raining hard, and to make things worse, the ________________ was beginning to rise.
  22. The flowers bloom in the ________________.
  23. Buy me a box of chocolates and I'll be ________________.
  24. There's a broken ________________ in the bed.

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

Answer key

  1. bark — a dog's sound
  2. face — to point toward
  3. prune — the fruit
  4. bark — of a tree
  5. face — part of the head
  6. face — to confront
  7. content — videos and posts
  8. prune — to trim
  9. bark — to shout
  10. cold — an illness
  11. tear — to rip
  12. tear — from crying
  13. wind — moving air
  14. prune — to trim
  15. cold — the Cold War
  16. cold — not warm
  17. tear — from crying
  18. wind — to turn a key
  19. spring — of water
  20. content — the amount
  21. wind — moving air
  22. spring — the season
  23. content — happy
  24. spring — a coil

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