觉 has two readings. Default to jué for the wide family of perception/awareness words: 觉得, 感觉, 发觉, 视觉, 自觉. Switch to jiào only when the word means 'a sleep' (see the separate jiào entry: 睡觉, 午觉).
memory
Read the shape top-down: small dots (⺍) stirring above a cover (冖) drop down into the 见 'see' radical — something pierces the veil and the eye catches it. That is the jué feeling: a flicker of awareness.
Bottom 'see' radical (Kangxi #147) — simplified from 見, a person 儿 with an enlarged 目 eye on top. It anchors the perception family: 视觉, 听觉, 感觉. The jiào 'sleep' reading is a rebus borrowing — not pictured here.
semantic
⺍xiǎo
small (top dots form)
Top three short strokes — the compressed top form of 小, also sitting atop 学, 党, 常. Three small flickers above the eye below — a tiny stir that the 见 radical at the bottom 'sees'.
Middle cover-shape — a horizontal canopy with downward hooks at each end, picturing a roof or curtain. Inside 觉 it veils the eye below: the dots above reach through the cover into perception. Same cover sits in 写 and 军.
