Decoding is the process by which students use letter-sound relationships to translate a word from a series of symbols to a unit of meaning (Fountas & Pinnell, 2009). Students attempt to read a word by sounding out the individual letters and blending the sounds together. For decoding to be successful, students must be able to recognize the sound associated with each letter or letter group (Cain, 2010). When students understand the relationship between letters and sounds, they are able to recognize familiar words and decode unfamiliar words at a faster rate. For example, if a student is trying to read the word “hat” they can start by sounding out each individual phoneme /h/ /a/ /t/ and putting the sounds they hear together quickly to say the word. Decoding is an important skill in learning to read!
Resources: Cain, K. (2010). Learning to read words. In K. Cain, Reading Development & Difficulties (Ch. 4, pp. 68-80). Toronto: Wiley. Fountas, I. C., & Pinnell, G. S. (2017). When readers struggle: Teaching that works. Portsmouth: Heinemann. https://www.fountasandpinnell.com/whenreadersstruggle/