Word decoding

Identifying written words using orthographic and phonological information. Decoding accuracy or fluency should be distinguished from understanding the propositions and inferences in a text.

Deriving a pronunciation from print. Successful recoding can supply a learning opportunity for the particular written form, rather than being only a temporary alternative to recognition.^[ref]

A grapheme–phoneme correspondence links a written unit with a speech-sound unit. One grapheme can contain several letters, so correspondence is not necessarily a one-letter-to-one-sound rule. The mapping can depend on context and competing patterns in a writing system. Learning useful mappings supports phonological recoding, while recognizing the spoken form of a word is only one contribution to understanding a text. ^[ref]