Speech Synthesis Shield DFR0293

I have just gotten one of these Speech Synthesis Shields.

Can someone tell me how to pass a value to the the shield so that I can have it speak the value? For example; if my sketch computes the number 3 as a result, how to I get it to speak the number 3? I have tried everything I can think of, but I have to physically type in quote marks around the number, and then pass it as in SpeechSynthesis.English(ssr,4,"3") - which works. However there doesn't seem to be a way to build that line with any String handlers.

So these don't work;
SpeechSynthesis.English(ssr,4,3);
nor does SpeechSynthesis.English(ssr,4,String(3));
nor does String thisString = String(3) as in SpeechSynthesis.English(ssr,4,thisString);
nor even; String myStr=("\"3\"\n") - which returns "3"; as in SpeechSynthesis.English(ssr,4,myStr);

None of which seem to work. Anybody with knowledge about this shield that can offer insight - thanks.