Past tense of instruct; taught someone how to do something or gave them orders or directions to follow.
From Latin 'instruere' meaning 'to arrange' or 'to prepare.' The prefix 'in-' means 'into' and 'struere' means 'to build or construct.'
The word 'instruct' literally means 'to build into'—teaching was seen as building knowledge into someone's mind, a metaphor so powerful we still use it today when we say we're 'building' our understanding!
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