Let’s first start with “letters.” When you pick up a book and start to read, your brain recognizes a pattern as “writing” and sends signals to a special word-decoding area. This word-reading area has special skills. It has learned to recognize “a” as the same letter no matter how it is written or what size it is. It also knows that “p” and “q” are different letters, even though they are basically the same shape.
And then we have “words.” When a neuron fires, it sends a signal to the other neurons it is connected to. For words you have seen before and recognize easily, the shape of the words triggers the memory of their meaning and how they sound. It also triggers other memories connected to the word. When you see the word “cake,” you remember that it is sweet and delicious and also recall times you have eaten cake, who you ate it with, how it tasted and smelled, what your favorite kind was, and maybe how you made it.
Finally, the brain puts together the meanings of words based on where they are in the sentence to get a bigger idea. This idea goes back into your working memory as you assemble more sentences and ideas, which connect up into a paragraph, and finally into a story!