The Power of Word Mapping Tools: MySpeekie® for Spelling and Word Mapping Mastery®
 

🌍 A World First:

Bi-directional Word Mapping Mastery Tool
Speech to Print and Print to Speech Supporting Linguistic and Neurodiversity

By typing the sounds they hear using Phonemies, introduced during the initial Speech Sound Play phase, children engage directly with the speech-to-print process. This helps them understand how spoken words are made up of sounds, and how those sounds are represented in writing. They start from speech, which is the most natural entry point, and check whether their speech sounds are used in the word. If they are not, that becomes a valuable learning moment.
 

We support adults to help children type the word itself, using the MyWordz®, the Word Mapping Tools, so that they can explore its graphophonemic structure. This makes visible what so many find difficult to understand. English has an opaque orthography, and its letter–sound combinations can appear chaotic or confusing. So we show it. Without the pressure of memorising hundreds of graphemes and their associated sounds, children build confidence. They begin to see spelling patterns and realise that there is logic to English. It is highly structured and mathematical, with every letter having a role.

If the word they want to type does not appear, either because it is not in the dataset or the sounds they typed do not match, they can say the word aloud using Check Mapping to explore its structure. They can then return to MySpeekie® and go through the typing process again. This act of typing is key. It builds phonemic awareness and strengthens working memory. It also reinforces the connection between speech and spelling.

MySpeekie® for Spelling supports children with dyslexia and other neurodivergent profiles by addressing the core difficulties that often prevent progress. Phonemic awareness and phonological working memory challenges can use up so much cognitive effort that children struggle to move into the self-teaching phase. This is why Speech Sound Play matters!

Reaching the self-teaching phase (Share, 1995) means children can recognise and read words automatically, without needing to decode each one. This frees up cognitive resources so they can focus on fluency, comprehension, and meaning. MySpeekie® for Spelling reduces the mental load by allowing children to explore word structure in both directions. They learn to link sounds to spellings and spellings to sounds.

Using the Map and Drag tool, children can create and print their own words through MyWordz®, building personal word banks that reflect their vocabulary and interests.

This approach helps children store words in the brain’s word bank, known as the orthographic lexicon. This is essential for fluent reading and spelling. It supports the move toward orthographic mapping, where children connect pronunciation, spelling, and meaning with increasing ease and confidence (Share, 1995; Ehri, 2014).

This is how learners move toward Word Mapping Mastery®. Word Mapping Mastery is not only about mapping speech sounds to 'Sound Pics' (graphemes). The process also introduces learners to morphology, which refers to the smallest units of meaning, and to etymology, which explains why words are spelled in particular ways.

Research shows that teachers, although skilled readers, often struggle to explain word structure. This is because they do not need to think about it when reading. Most of the mapping they do is unconscious. The learning is implicit. This process helps adults guide children with greater clarity and confidence. Concepts that teachers already apply automatically become more visible and explicit. While many children will develop these understandings through reading, a deeper, conscious awareness can only support the process, especially for those guiding others.

Because children experience such a high level of success storing words in the orthographic lexicon (brain word bank), with speech sounds, spelling, and meaning glued together, they feel proud and excited about mapping words. That confidence and independence makes all the difference. Our goal is that spelling makes them smile!