What do you call the smallest written representation of a sound?

The smallest written representation of a sound is referred to as a grapheme. A grapheme can be a letter or a combination of letters that represent a single sound in a language, serving as the written counterpart to a phoneme, which is the smallest unit of sound in speech. For example, the letter "a" or the combination "sh" can be graphemes in English, and they correlate to their respective sounds in spoken language.

In the context of this question, understanding that graphemes are essential for literacy and phonics instruction is critical. They enable learners to connect sounds with their written symbols, facilitating reading and writing skills. As students decode text, identifying graphemes helps them determine what phonemes they are supposed to articulate.

The concept of a phoneme often gets closely related to graphemes, but while a phoneme refers to the spoken sound, a grapheme is its written equivalent. This distinction is fundamental to understanding the relationship between sounds in a language and their written representation.