Speech Sound Mapping! Speech Sound Play (SSP) Before Speech Sound Pics® with Phonemies: A 10-Day Sound Start to Word Mapping Mastery for All Learners, using ReadABLE Words. Celebrating Diversity in Every Voice With MySpeekie®, the One-Screen AAC.
10-Day Dyslexia 'Screen & Intervene' Plan with MySpeekie®: Develop speech sound awareness through Phonemies Play, supporting children before or alongside systematic synthetic phonics (SSP). The Speech Sound Mapping (SSM) Plan is also available as a stand-alone option for children with SLCN.
Quacking the Code! Mapping Speech Sounds to Speech Sound Pics
If we take pictures of Speech Sounds, what might they look like, in that word?
Speech Sound Pics are graphemes. It's easier for little ones to understand the concept of letters being used to represent speech sounds in written words.
After completing the 10-day plan, children are ready for FAST phonics!
Use the 30-Minute SSP Visual and Linguistic Phonics Routine
If you choose to move from Day 10 to the Speech Sound Pics Approach, rather than a synthetic phohnics programme, phonics curriculum content is taught through a 30-minute daily routine that is usually completed by the end of Reception (half the time of a synthetic phonics programme). All children are expected to recognise and blend the 100 or so Core Code GPCs within that time frame, thanks to the activities and the ability to learn at their own pace.
The Speech Sound Pics Approach is predominantly a visual and linguistic phonics approach, with a focus on understanding how to map words and how letters and sounds connect in both directions: from speech to print (spelling) and from print to speech (decoding). The Speech Sound Pics (SSP) Approach is used across Australia.
Regardless of the synthetic phonics programme used, which is primarily print to speech with a focus on decoding, you can use Speech to Print Spelling as a separate activity with a focus on spelling. The DfE separates the two, so there is no issue running a synthetic phonics programme to teach decoding and also using Speech Sound Play (SSP) Spelling to teach encoding. Use MySpeekie® and the Monster Spelling Piano for Speech to Print Spelling in the Early Years. This ensures that linguistic and neurodiversity are embraced.
Let's get SSP for Spelling rolled out across the UK, to improve this dire data!
Next Steps!
Learning the SSP Core Code Levels
This is an option for learning the 4 Code Levels in Reception, to get phonics instruction out of the way quickly and easily, so that children can move into the self-teaching phase and focus on reading fluency and comprehension. SSP here refers to the Speech Sound Pics Approach. We used that abbreviation before 'SSP' became widely used in England, when it was simply called 'synthetic phonics', not 'systematic synthetic phonics'!
Start the Phase 2 Thirty Minute Routine after Phase 1with Phonemies.
The Speech Sound Pics (SSP) Approach
Start with the 10 Day Speech Sound Play Plan (this site)
This is Phase 1 and ensures that we have screened for learning differences, and addressed the issues children laster diagnosed with dyslexia face (we get in early to prevent learning difficulties)
Then move to the 30 Minute Daily Phonics Routine.
Add in the other activities - Snap and Crack, Rapid Writing, Speedy Six Spelling etc -
All of these post 10 Day Plan activities are shown on the WordMappingMastery.com site
A Closer Look at the SSP Coding Poster - Activity 3 within the 30 Minute Routine
They LEARN with the tech, and demonstate MASTERY using the poster.
Activity 3 of the A3 Core Code
- SSP Coding Poster: Blending the Sound Pics (Code Level GPCs).
Exploring words that are decodable to the child at their current Code Level.
Hands-on routines build automaticity through spaced repetition.
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1 Phonemic Awareness Activity – 60–90 secs
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2 Sound Pic Formation & Recognition – 60–90 secs
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3 Blending of Code Level Sound Pics – 90 secs
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4 Chants – 90 secs
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5 High-Frequency Words (HFWs) – 2 mins
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6 Code Level Sentences (Sound Pics + HFWs) – 2 mins
Designed by the Neurodivergent Reading Whisperer to embrace linguistic and neurodiversity. This is schema-driven phonics learning
Letting children do more themselves! Less teaching, more learning.
Children love being in charge of their own learning pace and doing more than listening. The goal of the Speech Sound Pics (SSP) Approach is to make children far more independent—and to help them enjoy just getting on with it!
The ICRWY tech and tools allow each child to systematically and explicitly learn the expected phonics and high-frequency word content in much less time. Over 90% are out of the synthetic phonics phase, and can easily pass the PSC, before they start Year 1. It’s so much easier to teach this way. Teachers are freed up to check in with individual children, and when a relief teacher steps in, the children just follow the familiar routines. Children can do it at home - eg if there are school closures, or the child is unable to attend.
Children need supervision and support—not traditional 'teaching' as such. A good TA can supervise, freeing up teachers to work 1 on 1 with children or hear them read. As we did in the good old days! We get the GPC recognition and blending work done and dusted quickly, so that children can focus on reading about what interests them. Let's that be our goal moving forwards: every child excited about reading!
Miss Emma MEd SEN
Phase 2 in Classrooms Starts after Speech Sound Play with Phonemies (the 10 Day Plan)
The 30-Minute Phonics Routine begins:
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5 minutes – Solo or Paired Decoding
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5–8 minutes – Coding Poster Lesson (ICRWY Lessons app)
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10–15 minutes – Coding Poster (using an A3 coding poster to include the HFW section):
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60–90 secs – Phonemic awareness activity
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60–90 secs – Sound Pic (grapheme) formation and recognition
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90 secs – Blending of Code Level Sound Pics
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90 secs – Chants
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120 secs – High-frequency words
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120 secs – Code Level Sentences (Sound Pics with HFWs)
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Additional Word Mapping Mastery activities are gradually introduced, including:
Also do these activities at home, or as an intervention for those who struggled to learn phonics with a synthetic phonics programme.
This is an easier way for autistic children to learn to decode as it makes more sense to pattern seeking brains.