'We are PASSIONATE about teaching EVERY child
to read for pleasure!'

The only way to successfully learn to read in English is to know the 'speech sound' values of the letters. We call them 'pictures of speech sounds'

ie 'Speech Sound Pics'.
Welcome to the home of the
Speech Sound Pics (SSP) Approach!

The written code was created to represent speech sounds, not the other way around, so a 'Speech to Print' approach is taken. Phonics is essential for ALL readers, but students will struggle to learn phonics without good phonemic awareness.
We use our unique patented technique 'Code Mapping' to SHOW students how all words are segmented into sound units (graphemes).
This sentence is code mapped!  

Even when children have good phonemic awareness and are taught 'phonics' they can struggle to know how to pronounce the graphemes they see in unfamiliar words. Many teachers would use phonetic symbols, but these are less appealing to young children. Miss Emma, therefore, created 'Speech Sound Monsters' as an alternative. She 'Code Maps' and 'Monster Maps' texts and books for them, so that they can actually read unfamiliar texts without any help, and reach the stage of 'orthographic mapping' far earlier! 

Miss Emma is a highly successful teacher and former OFSTED Inspector. She has a Masters Degree in Special Educational Needs (Dyslexia focus) and is undertaking doctoral study in the UK (with a research focus on phonemic awareness and dyslexia)

Reading scientists often ask why research is not used to inform (and change) practice and 'end the reading wars', and yet often do not go into real classrooms and actually see what is happening. Many teachers face difficulties when trying to apply the science, for example, they WANT to teach children to map phonemes to graphemes for all words and are told, instead, to ask their students to memorise whole words as 'sight words'. Or they want to give children scaffolded readers that align with the order in which they are explicitly teaching the alphabetic code, and are instead only supplied with 'levelled readers' that force children to use 'three cueing' strategies because they cannot (yet) decode those words, even though being taught phonics systematically.
Miss Emma is a teacher and supports thousands of teachers around the world. She understands the science, and the realities faced by teachers. She's a problem solver who is helping to bridge the gap and to evoke discussion about research in action. For example, her latest resources, available to subscribers, enable teachers to run the 'guided reading groups' they are often told to run and focus on 'reading levels' and 'benchmarked' every year - but with resources that align with SoR. She has 'SSP'd the PM benchmarking system so that children can actually READ these texts without needing to guess from illustrations, 'first sounds, or to memorise or predict words! The average child can then 'benchmark' unseen test texts and achieve a reading 'level' around 18 months to 2 years ABOVE the expected grade level. If you are a parent and want to help your child pass the UK phonics test, or to get a higher PM benchmark, regardless of what is happening in schools, please do read 'Pass the Test' and get a membership Teacher? Why not look at her literacy block teaching structure, to see how she teaches Reception? Or read testimonials from teachers? Miss Emma runs training via zoom, from the UK, and Kylie runs workshops and delivers teacher training in Australia. 

Resources and activities developed by The Reading Whisperer 'Miss Emma' BEd Hons. (EY Specialism) MA Special Educational Needs (Dyslexia) Doctoral Student

​

​

​

Enhance and extend Communication, Language and Literacy activities

All in One Place

Visual and Linguistic Phonics

for literacy

Monster Mapping®

Miss Emma's
Speech Sound Monsters

What are 'Speech Sound Monsters'?

There is a 'phoneme' Monster for every English speech sound. So think of each as being an alternative to a phonetic symbol from the IPA. They enable children to work out how to pronounce the graphemes without help from adults (ie they are 'teacherless teaching tools') and show adults which phonemes they can hear, even if they cannot (or choose not to) produce the speech sounds. 'Monster Mapping' is a fantastic diagnostic tool as adults know how children are segmenting, blending and manipulating phonemes even when they do not yet know the correct graphemes for that word.
The (phoneme) monsters enable children to learn phonics at a rapid pace, and reach the 'self-teaching' phase far earlier. 
Download this free Monster Mapping info poster and print in A3.