Teacher Use Case

Experience Speech Kingdom in Action with Heidi Otterman

Explore the real-world application of Speech Kingdom through the expertise of Heidi Otterman, an outstanding educator with over 20 years of experience teaching kindergarten through sixth grade. With a background in leading special education programs and as a mother of five, including a child with high-functioning autism, Ms. Otterman brings a unique blend of personal and professional insights to her work. Her dedication and comprehensive understanding make her an invaluable asset in demonstrating the benefits of Speech Kingdom in academic settings.

Meet Heidi Otterman: A Distinguished Educator

Heidi Otterman brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to Speech Kingdom. She holds degrees in Deaf Studies and Multi-Subject Teaching Credentials, has completed a Special Education Program, and earned a Master’s Degree. Her impressive background includes working in a university autistic program/study. Renowned as the "go-to" teacher on campus, she excels in supporting the most challenging special education students. Ms. Otterman describes her classroom as resembling a "reverse mainstream classroom," highlighting her innovative approach to education.

​​​​​​​Since 2017, Ms. Otterman has been piloting Speech Kingdom in her classroom. We have invited her to share her successful implementation methods that she uses with her students.

Interactive Social Stories

Getting Started with Speech Kingdom

I integrate Speech Kingdom's social stories to support students across a variety of needs, including those on the autism spectrum, and those with social issues, behavioral challenges, developmental delays, traumatic brain injuries, and other comprehension difficulties. These social stories help me "front load" students before new experiences or allow them to revisit situations that had undesirable outcomes. By teaching essential skills, social stories prepare students for successful future experiences.

Innovative Strategies with Speech Kingdom

Speech Kingdom's social stories provide strategies that I may not have tried before. Often, teachers have exhausted multiple approaches or lacked the necessary tools to effectively support special needs students. Speech Kingdom bridges this gap, offering the essential resources to achieve success.

Routines Build Confidence with Speech Kingdom

Speech Kingdom's social stories are integral to the daily routines of some students. Routines offer children security, stability, and predictability, which are crucial for their development. For children with special needs, routines are especially important as they help reduce stress and anxiety, making them an essential tool for fostering confidence and well-being.

EFFECTIVE USE OF SPEECH KINGDOM

The time required to complete a Speech Kingdom social story varies based on the student's needs and the developmental level of the story. As my students and I become more familiar with the Speech Kingdom program and the stories we've used, our screen time decreases. As students start to internalize the skills, the need to revisit specific stories lessens, allowing us to explore new topics. I utilize social stories as a crucial tool in my ongoing effort to ensure my students' success

Student Avatars - A Unique Important Feature

Personalized Learning with Speech Kingdom

Speech Kingdom places the student and parent (or other adult) directly in the stories, complete with speaking and animation. This personalization helps students connect with the lessons on a deeply personal level.

When students see themselves in the story, a natural phenomenon occurs—they pay more attention and relate to what is happening, significantly enhancing the story's effectiveness. Embedding the child in each story encourages third-person talk, such as "Billy wants to play." This approach naturally transitions to self-talk, like "I want to play."

Through the student's avatar, I use third-person conversations to ask questions, guiding the student from seeing their avatar's desires to recognizing that they are their avatar. Eventually, "Billy wants to play" becomes "I want to play." I use affirming statements to comment on the child in the story, using their name. We begin by discussing what is happening in the story and speaking in the third person about the child, such as "What did Joe do?" or "Joe made a great choice!" My goal is to help the student realize they are their avatar, transitioning from "Joe made a great choice!" to "I made a great choice!"

Supporting ASD, ADHD and ELL Learners with Speech Kingdom

Speech Kingdom stories are designed with students on the autism spectrum in mind, but they are equally effective for all students. I have successfully used these stories to teach skill-specific vocabulary to English Language Learners (ELL). Additionally, Speech Kingdom aligns well with the nationwide Positive Behavior Intervention System (PBIS) used in public schools, focusing on fundamental skills.

​​​​​​​With a specific skill-driven format, teachers can easily identify and teach targeted skills while collecting data on their frequency of use. This data is invaluable for ongoing monitoring of student progress. When implemented school-wide, Speech Kingdom fosters a consistent approach to promoting a positive school culture. Parents using Speech Kingdom at home observe similar positive results on a more personal level.

Enhancing Inner Thoughts and Theory of Mind with Speech Kingdom

For students on the autism spectrum and those with disabilities affecting their ability to process information, limited Theory of Mind can cause daily stress and frustration. These children often struggle to understand the perspectives of others and find it difficult to pay attention when they are not directly involved.

Speech Kingdom helps students visualize their own inner thoughts and the inner thoughts of others, which aids in understanding different perspectives. This enhanced perspective allows children to internalize various situations and succeed in answering questions about social stories. These questions may be the comprehension questions provided by Speech Kingdom or additional questions posed by me.

As students discuss and answer questions about social stories, I witness and celebrate their deeper understanding. This understanding often emerges before they can fully apply the social story situations to their own real-life experiences.

Enhancing Focus and Episodic Memory with Speech Kingdom

Focus is critical to memory. As focus heightens, memory increases. Speech Kingdom places students in scenes to dramatically boost their focus and help them accurately remember what they see, using their avatars to achieve this.

Episodic memory, a part of our long-term memory, stores information from events in which we have been involved. By "tricking" their brains through the use of avatars in these events, students are more likely to store these experiences in their long-term memory. Using an avatar instead of human interaction reduces stress for students on the autism spectrum and lowers anxiety for neurotypical students as well.

Low Stress and Retention with Speech Kingdom

I always pay attention to my students' anxiety levels and consider their background knowledge, which helps to increase their success. Creating a low-stress environment and adjusting plans when necessary allows my students to master new skills more effectively.

Establishing background knowledge is vital for students to absorb new information. This background knowledge acts as the "glue" that helps new knowledge stick. The more connections we make, the higher the likelihood that information will be stored in long-term memory. Speech Kingdom social stories help create this background knowledge for students, resulting in low anxiety and low stress.

Sometimes, I create hand signals or cues for each scene and then transition the student to use only these cues. By gradually reducing the level of prompting, I help the student transfer the associated skills to real-life situations.

Increased Vocabulary and Behavior Improvements with Speech Kingdom

Even as infants, we experience feelings of anxiety when our needs are unmet, and our cries become more anxious over time. Everyone needs to express their wants and needs, and vocabulary is essential for being understood.

Speech Kingdom's social stories provide the necessary vocabulary. They teach the language a student needs to succeed in various scenarios using simple, easy-to-understand sentences. Repetition works like a hook, creating a connection between vocabulary and the corresponding skill. As language skills increase, so does success.

Enhancing Generalization with Speech Kingdom


Generalization occurs when a student who learns a skill in one specific scenario applies that skill in other scenarios. For example, a child with ASD who learns to raise their hand during carpet time also realizes they should raise their hand when seated at their desk.

​​​​​​​Speech Kingdom stories address various scenarios and provide opportunities for conversations with students about when to use specific skills. Using Speech Kingdom in multiple settings, such as home, school, and therapy sessions, encourages students to generalize their skills further. When a parent uses Speech Kingdom at home, a teacher uses it in the classroom, and a therapist uses it in their clinic, students quickly learn that the expectations are consistent across all these settings. This helps students work towards independently repeating the skill without cues or reminders.

Workbooks, Worksheets, and IEP Meetings with Speech Kingdom with Speech Kingdom

Each social story in Speech Kingdom includes a link to a unique downloadable PDF worksheet that matches the story's level. These worksheets use language referenced in the corresponding social story. I highly recommend printing the worksheet for each story before working on it with a student.

Each Fundamental level story includes a three-page downloadable PDF workbook. These workbooks feature coloring pages and writing practice from each scene. Students read, trace, and print the actual spoken words from the associated Fundamental story. Beginner level worksheets are picture-based, featuring groups of pictures from the story paired with corresponding vocabulary words. Intermediate level worksheets use a fill-in-the-blank format, while Advanced level worksheets follow the same format but include twice as many sentences and choices.

I use worksheets to front-load vocabulary, reinforce learning, and check for comprehension. Worksheets are an excellent way to revisit the skill being taught and to collect evidence of student progress.

Having concrete examples is incredibly helpful during parent meetings or IEP discussions. Being able to say, "This is exactly what the program looks like and this is the exact language we are using," provides clarity and supports the discussion about the student's progress.

Detailed Reporting with Speech Kingdom

Speech Kingdom’s extensive reporting module provides extensive data that focuses on the details of each individual session. Such details include the date, time spent, information covered, focus (or reason) for the story selection, and comprehension accuracy down to the number of attempts and the number of skipped questions.


Reports can be run in both detail and summary formats and can be run for stories, games, or for a combination of stories and games. Use Speech Kingdom reports at IEP meetings to dramatically cut down on acrimony and reduce costly litigation.

Language Games

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While the Speech Kingdom platform presents best on Chromebooks, Windows computers, Apple computers, and tablets, it is compatible with virtually any WIFI-enabled device.

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