Words that have more than one meaning can change the meaning of a sentence and affect understanding. Students need to understand that some words have multiple meanings and that we use context to determine which meaning is intended. So, how do you teach students about multiple meaning words? In this teaching guide, I’ll discuss why this skill is important and how to teach multiple meaning words in speech therapy.
What are Multiple Meaning Words?
Multiple meaning words are words that have more than one meaning. The meaning depends on how the word is used in a sentence. For example, the word “bat” has two meanings: the animal and a baseball bat.
Why Do We Teach Multiple Meaning Words?
Understanding that words can have multiple meanings helps children build stronger vocabulary and reading comprehension skills. It also helps them understand that a word they know may have a different meaning when used in a different context.
How To Teach Multiple Meaning Words in Speech Therapy
Introduce the concept with examples and visuals
You can introduce the concept of multiple meaning words with clear visuals and examples. Using a variety of examples can help students understand the concept more easily.
Provide some quick practice opportunities
After introducing the concept of multiple meaning words, you can provide some opportunities to put the concept into practice. This is also called a mini-lesson in vocabulary intervention where you focus on a skill and provide short and intensive practice opportunities for the student to understand the concept. They can then use this skill as a tool for reading comprehension when they engage with language in natural contexts such as books, stories, conversations, and everyday activities.
For multiple meaning words, I like to provide scaffolding by starting with easier tasks and providing supports like visuals and choices, then gradually moving to more difficult tasks where the student answers independently. For example, I like to move through these three types of tasks.
1. Finding the correct meaning of the word
In this task the student is provided with a sentence and they choose the correct meaning of the word from two choices. For example:
- I ate a juicy orange.
- the fruit
- the color
2. Saying the correct meaning
In this task the student says the two meanings of a word when used in two different sentences. For example:
- What does “orange” mean in each sentence?
- “I ate a juicy orange.”
- “I grabbed the orange marker.”
3. Using the meaning correctly in a sentence
In this task, the student is provided with a word with two meanings, then creates a sentence using each meaning. For example:
- Make a sentence for each meaning of the word “orange”.
- Noun: a fruit
- Adjective: a color
I also like to include words that have multiple meanings from both the same and different parts of speech. For example:
- Noun + noun: e.g., bat (animal vs. baseball bat)
- Noun + adjective: e.g., orange (fruit vs. color)
- Noun + verb: e.g., fly (the insect vs. to fly)
- Adjective + adjective: e.g., hard (difficult vs. not soft)
After some practice, you’ll be able to determine whether the child has grasped the concept of multiple meaning words and is ready to apply these skills in natural contexts.
Practice in meaningful contexts
Language intervention is most effective when it’s contextualized, so that means using natural meaningful contexts like books, short stories, toys, games, etc. More on that in the next section!
Activities to Teach and Practice Multiple Meaning Words
Here is an example of how you could teach and practice multiple meaning words in speech therapy sessions.
Mini-Lesson
As I mentioned earlier, using visuals and a few activity pages can provide short and intensive practice opportunities for the student to understand this language concept before they put these skills into practice with contextualized language intervention.
I’ve created an activity packet with parent handouts, visuals, and practice activities you can use for mini-lessons or for review. It provides scaffolding and practice opportunities to support students as they learn the concept of multiple meaning words. You can check it out here!
Reading Books and Story Retell
Reading books, comics, short stories, and other types of texts is a great way to create a meaningful context for language intervention.
First, read the story as a whole. Then, go back and discuss any multiple meaning words that may affect reading comprehension. You can talk about the different meanings of the word and identify the context clues that helped determine its meaning. Then, the student can make a sentence using each meaning.
Finally, you can read the story again or have the student retell it and stop to discuss the target word when it comes up again. This gives the student another opportunity to practice and it helps connect structured practice back to meaningful language use.
Adapting Activities to Virtual Sessions
If you are a tele-therapist and provide virtual speech therapy sessions, you could use the digital activities in the Activity Packet or any other teaching materials for the mini-lesson part. Then, for contextualized practice, you could use digital books, writing tasks with the remote control options, or show videos or clips of a TV show.
Carryover and Home Practice
Caregivers and teachers can help students practice multiple meaning words during everyday activities, such as reading books, having conversations, completing homework, or participating in classroom activities. When a familiar word is used in a new way, pause to discuss its different meanings and talk about the context clues that help determine which meaning is intended. This helps students build vocabulary, strengthen reading comprehension, and become more flexible in understanding that words can have different meanings in different situations.
You can also provide caregivers and teachers with information handouts that summarize how they can support the child’s vocabulary development using multiple meaning words.
What’s Next?
Once a child understands the concept of multiple meaning words, they can apply these skills within evidence-based language intervention strategies, such as:
- Context clues
- Explicit vocabulary instruction
- Semantic feature analysis
Students could also continue building their semantic knowledge by learning other types of word relationships such as synonyms, antonyms, and shades of meaning.
A Step-by-Step Resource for Teaching Multiple Meaning Words
We’ve discussed how to teach multiple meaning words in speech therapy step by step. Whether you’re a speech therapist, parent, or educator, teaching this skill can be simple and effective! If you’re looking for a structured way to introduce and teach this skill, my Multiple Meaning Words Activity Packet includes teaching visuals, parent handouts, and scaffolded practice opportunities that are perfect to use as a mini-lesson for students to understand this important language concept.
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