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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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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: race · chest · row · capital · cell · court · stem · lie

  1. Is it always a sin to tell a ________________?
  2. She laid her head on my ________________ so she could listen to my heartbeat.
  3. The ball is in your ________________.
  4. The hunter does not ________________ down with the prey.
  5. Only by prohibiting all nuclear weapons, we can together stop the arms ________________.
  6. Scientists study ________________ cells to repair damaged tissue.
  7. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  8. I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my ________________.
  9. A ________________ is a veil over the lips.
  10. I had a ________________ with my boss today.
  11. Beijing is the ________________ of China.
  12. Oh no! I wasn't paying attention and left my ________________ phone in the restaurant!
  13. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  14. The lid of the ________________ creaked open.
  15. He was locked up in a ________________.
  16. The girl drawing a picture in the first ________________ is my niece.
  17. A second agreement was made due to the large amount of available ________________.
  18. We had to ________________ the boat across the lake.
  19. Winning one ________________ isn't the same as dominating a sport.
  20. Each ________________ is a complete and highly sophisticated living world in its own right.
  21. The big green plant was starting to droop at the ________________.
  22. Atomic bombs are a danger to the human ________________.
  23. The beginning of a sentence starts with a ________________ letter.
  24. Many English words ________________ from Latin.

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

Answer key

  1. lie — an untruth
  2. chest — of your body
  3. court — for sport
  4. lie — to recline
  5. race — the arms race
  6. stem — a stem cell
  7. court — of a king
  8. chest — of your body
  9. lie — an untruth
  10. row — a quarrel
  11. capital — a city
  12. cell — a phone
  13. court — of law
  14. chest — a box
  15. cell — in a prison
  16. row — a line
  17. capital — money
  18. row — to paddle
  19. race — a contest
  20. cell — in biology
  21. stem — of a plant
  22. race — humankind
  23. capital — a big letter
  24. stem — to come from

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