What does it mean to decode a word?

What does it mean to decode a word?

• A. To sound out words by using letter-sound relationships.
• B. To interpret a word's meaning by context.
• C. To spell a word from memory.
• D. To identify the author of a word.

Answer: (A)

Decoding is turning written letters into spoken sounds by using letter-sound relationships and blending those sounds to pronounce a word. This is the skill behind sounding out unfamiliar words, so you can read them aloud even if you’ve never seen them before. For example, recognizing that the letters in a word map to the sounds and then blending those sounds together produces the spoken word. Decoding focuses on pronunciation and word recognition through phonics, not on understanding what a word means from context, not on spelling a word from memory, and not on who wrote it. Those other ideas involve meaning, memory, or authorship instead of sound-to-letter translation.

Decoding is turning written letters into spoken sounds by using letter-sound relationships and blending those sounds to pronounce a word. This is the skill behind sounding out unfamiliar words, so you can read them aloud even if you’ve never seen them before. For example, recognizing that the letters in a word map to the sounds and then blending those sounds together produces the spoken word. Decoding focuses on pronunciation and word recognition through phonics, not on understanding what a word means from context, not on spelling a word from memory, and not on who wrote it. Those other ideas involve meaning, memory, or authorship instead of sound-to-letter translation.