Decoding means using the spelling of a word to reconstruct its pronunciation. Early decoding involves sounding out and blending, but later decoding takes only a fast and silent spelling analysis. Digraphs are graphemes written with more than one letter. Explicit phonics describes a lesson in which the teacher pronounces phonemes to model how to sound out and blend. Phoneme awareness is knowledge of phoneme identities, i.e., recognizing individual phonemes in word contexts.
Phonological awareness is the ability to tune into speech sounds apart from meaning.
Segmentation means breaking down a word into word parts. Sight words are words a reader recognizes instantly. We normally store sight words as a biproduct of decoding. Vowels are phonemes made by sending sound from the vocal cords through an open, shaped mouth.