Other forms: instructions
An instruction is a statement telling you exactly how something must be done. No room for interpretation.
In the plural it means the printed guide, so following the instructions is what nobody does until the thing has already gone wrong. In the singular it is an order, and acting on instructions means doing as you were told. Computing uses it precisely, since a program is a list of instructions. There is a third and formal sense meaning teaching, as in religious instruction. The verb is instruct.
1nouninstructionAn order or direction telling someone what to do.
“His instructions were perfectly clear.”
2nounprintedThe printed directions for using something.
“The instructions were in four languages and none of them helped.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
Latin
īnstrūctiō
Old French
instruccion
Middle English
instruccioun
English, today
instruction
From Middle English instruccioun, from Old French instruccion, from Latin īnstrūctiō. From Middle English instruccioun, from Old French instruccion, from Latin instructio; equivalent to instruct + ion.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA