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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: court · clip · chest · firm · mouse · cold · shower · field

  1. It seems a cruel thing to ________________ a bird's wings.
  2. I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my ________________.
  3. He's taking a ________________ right now.
  4. She's an expert in the ________________ of medicine.
  5. She laid her head on my ________________ so she could listen to my heartbeat.
  6. The stadium has a track around the football ________________.
  7. Hold the papers together with a ________________.
  8. The ball is in your ________________.
  9. I thought I heard a ________________ in the kitchen.
  10. Nothing provides more peace of mind than a ________________ decision.
  11. The ________________ found him guilty of stealing money.
  12. We took cover from the thunder ________________.
  13. "I don't like games like this," squeaked the ________________.
  14. I'll stand ________________ for what I deserve.
  15. How can I extract the audio from a video ________________?
  16. When a clown is made king, the ________________ becomes a circus.
  17. The water is too ________________.
  18. The lid of the ________________ creaked open.
  19. Should I buy a wireless ________________?
  20. She works as an advertiser at a New Jersey ________________.
  21. Its rival in the ________________ War, the Soviet Union, exploited this at the time.
  22. The dagger's metal was presumably from the same meteor ________________.
  23. Vegetables are growing on this ________________.
  24. I had a bad ________________ and was in bed for a week.

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

Answer key

  1. clip — to cut
  2. chest — of your body
  3. shower — to wash
  4. field — a subject
  5. chest — of your body
  6. field — for sport
  7. clip — for paper
  8. court — for sport
  9. mouse — the animal
  10. firm — decided
  11. court — of law
  12. shower — rain
  13. mouse — the animal
  14. firm — steady
  15. clip — a video
  16. court — of a king
  17. cold — not warm
  18. chest — a box
  19. mouse — for a computer
  20. firm — a company
  21. cold — the Cold War
  22. shower — a meteor shower
  23. field — farmland
  24. cold — an illness

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