The words encoding and decoding are thrown around a lot when we talk about students’ literacy but, just in case you’re still not 100% sure what they actually mean, here’s a quick rundown: ENCODING involves writing. Students think of a word they want to write and their brain connects the sounds to the letters (symbols) used to write them. For instance, say “/c/ /a/ /t/“ —> write CAT. DECODING is all about reading. Students see letters and their brain connects them to their sounds like this: See C