Workshops & Training
If adults are unable to effectively map words, they are ill-equipped to support children who are learning phonics. Phonics instruction occurs throughout the day as children continually encounter opportunities to read and spell, not just during the designated time for a synthetic phonics programme. Effective support requires an understanding of how to map sounds to written symbols across all learning contexts.
Phonemies help as they are used as phonetic symbols for children, and give non-speaking children a way of showing the phonemes they - or choose not to - produce
"Phonemic awareness provides children with an immunisation against illiteracy. Teachers without a solid understanding of word mapping may miss the opportunity to offer this, as for at least 1 in 4 children, it must be explicitly taught."
Emma Hartnell-Baker
Neurodivergent Reading Whisperer
Our Ducklings start word mapping from birth! They understand the Speech Sounds (Universal Code) the Sound Pics and the meaning of words. This ensures that words are stored in the orthographic lexicon, for instant recogition when reading and easy recall when spelling.
Phonemic Awareness provides children with an Immunisation Against Illiteracy. It is the ability to isolate, segment, and blend speech sounds, and to do this with 'pictures of sounds'—that is, graphemes. This mapping of phonemes to graphemes is referred to as phonics, but it applies to all words, not just those that can be decoded and encoded using the 100 or so GPCs (grapheme-phoneme correspondences) explicitly taught in synthetic phonics programmes.
Skilled readers navigate over 300 GPCs with ease. This is because most children transition from basic phonics to the self-teaching phase without difficulty—the more words they explore, the more they learn. However, without mastery of phonics, children cannot self-teach, which means they struggle to read with comprehension and fluency. And none of this is possible without a strong foundation in phonemic awareness.
To support students in achieving this, adults must also be able to map words effectively.
We will show you how. Bookmark this page for details of public Word Mapping (Speech Sound Mapping) workshops!
Request In-House Professional Development with Emma Hartnell-Baker
This 4 hour session can be delivered via Teams or Zoom
Word Mapping Workshop Overview
Phonics is the mandatory approach to teaching reading and spelling in England. However, only around 100 of the 350+ grapheme-to-phoneme correspondences are taught and tested in KS1. This is insufficient for at least 1 in 4 children to become skilled readers. Data reveals that more than 1 in 4 (27%) of children leave school unable to read at minimum levels, leaving them unable to cope with the literacy demands of secondary school.
Alongside your chosen synthetic phonics programme, teachers support children in reading and writing throughout the day across all curriculum subjects. Therefore, teachers must become skilled in accurately ‘sounding out’ words (providing the correct phonemes) and understanding which letters map to those phonemes (grapheme splits).
In this 4-hour Word Mapping Workshop, teachers will learn how to map words and check their mapping using tools designed to orthographically map words for children. They will also gain skills to better identify children who struggle with phoneme awareness and will be shown key activities that help children link speech sounds, graphemes, and meaning—enabling them to store words in the orthographic lexicon and begin to self-teach (Share, 1995; Ehri, 2014).
While much of learning to read is implicit, children need a foundational understanding to start reading words without conscious effort.
This workshop is not designed to teach teachers a specific programme. Instead, it focuses on helping teachers understand orthographic mapping, which can be difficult for skilled readers due to orthographic interference.
For example, ask a teacher to segment the words rich and pitch, and they might add an extra sound to the latter, mapping it as p i t ch because they can ‘see’ the word in their mind. (Castles and Coltheart 2004) In contrast, a toddler who is not yet familiar with spelling but has been using speech sound mapping with Phonemies will segment it correctly because they are focused solely on giving the sounds (see below). Similarly, ask a teacher to segment words like orange or was, and they might give an incorrect response, such as producing the wrong speech sounds for the grapheme /a/. A child using Speech Sound Mapping (SSM) with Phonemies, who does not yet have the visual knowledge of spelling, will give the correct sounds, e.g., /É’rɪnʤ/ and /wÉ’z/. They are using pure phonemic awareness without distractions.
Teachers need to return to this level of phonemic awareness to effectively teach phonics, regardless of what may be missing in their chosen phonics programme.
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I teach them how, showing how to overcome orthographic interference to better support their neurodiverse students.
Post-Workshop Support Teachers can join a support group to continue improving their word mapping skills and collaborate with others.
Training Costs
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£1750 / AU$3400 (plus travel expenses) with no limit on participants
(although delegates must be working with the school and may include relief teachers). -
Ask about our online delivery option
pitch pɪʧ rich rɪʧ
As children become skilled readers, they store a visual representation of words in the orthographic lexicon, which can distort their phonemic awareness. This is discussed in Reading in the Brain. If we ask toddlers who are Speech Sound Mapping with Phonemies to give the sounds in words like pitch and rich, they provide the correct phonemes (speech sounds). However, when we ask readers, including teachers of phonics, they often perceive pitch as having an extra phoneme. This is influenced by how frequently they engage in Word Mapping with students throughout the day.
Where else can you train with Emma Hartnell-Baker aka 'Miss Emma'?
Patoss is the Professional Association of Teachers of Students with Specific Learning Difficulties, for all those concerned with the teaching and support of pupils with SpLD, for example: dyslexic, dyspraxic, dyscalculic, ADHD. Membership is open to qualified teachers in SpLD and those studying for either the certificate or the diploma in SpLD.