A study was conducted to investigate children's ability to deal with multiple meaning words in isolation and in context. Four low-ability students and four high-ability students from grades two, four, and six were shown nouns rated at the prefourth, presixth, and pretenth grade levels, and asked to give the meaning of the words. Students received one point for each clear meaning produced for an isolated word and for each appropriate meaning of a word in context. As a group, students' scores with words in context were 50% greater than their scores with words out of context, indicating their ability to use context for comprehension. High-ability students produced 75% more correct responses than low-ability students, and the higher the grade level of the students the more correct were the responses they produced. High-ability second grade students gave 95% as many correct responses as low-ability sixth grade students, indicating that low-ability students' skill with multiple meaning words lags far behind that of high ability students, and that general skill with polysemous words increases as students progress through school. (HTH)