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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: cold · lean · ground · straw · last · march · rule · snap

  1. Vegetables slowly ________________ towards the light.
  2. When I ________________ my fingers, you'll wake up.
  3. A drowning man will clutch at a ________________.
  4. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  5. The water is too ________________.
  6. Will civil ________________ and democracy continue in Algeria?
  7. Remember our ________________: no talking to strangers, no matter what.
  8. ________________ out of it! You haven't done a thing all week.
  9. His birthday is in either ________________ or April.
  10. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.
  11. The band played a military ________________ at the parade.
  12. False peace will not ________________.
  13. At ________________, we arrived at the village.
  14. Add some ________________ pepper to it.
  15. Don't ________________ against the wall. It's just been painted.
  16. You don't have to ________________ at me like that.
  17. Today is the ________________ day of the holidays. Back to school tomorrow!
  18. We will have lived in Kyoto for eight years next ________________.
  19. The goat rested comfortably on a soft bed of ________________.
  20. He is as ________________ as a wolf.
  21. There's no middle ________________.
  22. The chairman did not ________________ out the possibility of a disagreement.
  23. The ________________ was covered with snow, as far as the eye could see.
  24. It always has to be a ________________ man with them.

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

Answer key

  1. lean — to bend
  2. snap — to click
  3. straw — to clutch at straws
  4. cold — the Cold War
  5. cold — not warm
  6. rule — government
  7. rule — a law
  8. snap — to snap out of it
  9. march — the month
  10. cold — an illness
  11. march — music
  12. last — to go on
  13. last — finally
  14. ground — crushed
  15. lean — to rest against
  16. snap — to speak sharply
  17. last — final
  18. march — the month
  19. straw — dry grass
  20. lean — thin
  21. ground — a position
  22. rule — to rule out
  23. ground — the earth
  24. straw — a straw man

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