Smart Dog

Three Ideas for Getting Your Dog into Therapy Work

Tango loves Mondays. Monday means Tango gets to visit two local elementary schools and be smothered with attention.

Tango's a therapy dog and his job right now is to listen to kids read. Kids who might not read as well as their classmates, they might have a little bit of a speech problem, or maybe they can't tell the difference between a period and a comma. 

Reading in front of classmates who may snicker, giggle, or poke fun at them actually inhibits their reading skills. That's where dogs enter the picture!

Dogs don't care if the kids skip a word, if they can't quite get the punctuation correct, or if they stutter a bit. Dogs just really like it when a child sits on the floor with them, softly rubbing the dog's fur as they struggle with each word on the page. Dogs don't judge. Dogs don't snicker. Dogs just eat up all the attention and will even offer an encouraging lick to the struggling reader.

Interested in getting your dog into therapy work? You're not limited to elementary schools and kids. Your dog could visit nursing homes, help relieve stress on a local college campus during stressful final exams, or visit wounded soldiers in the hospital.

Here are some ideas on how to get your dog ready for therapy work.
Good Manners Are A Must: Therapy dogs don't bark. They don't jump. And they aren't rough with their mouth. Get your dog into a local positive reinforcement (clicker training) class that specifically teaches good manners behaviors. [Good manners are Smart Dog U's specialty! We offer Canine Building Blocks to help teach your dog good manners!] You might need to go through your training class more than once to really solidify those good manners. Good therapy dogs are on their best behavior no matter how much the kids giggle and squirm, how roughly their handled by well-intentioned seniors, or how distracting the buzzes and beeps are on the hospital equipment. It takes time and practice, for sure.

Canine Good Citizen (CGC)  Test: The bare minimum requirements are the CGC credentials. The CGC is a 10-item test and it covers behaviors like walking on a loose leash, coming when called, reaction to distractions, and sitting politely for greetings. Take a look at the full list of CGC test items. A more advanced test may be required if you and your dog wish to visit schools, detention centers, psychiatric facilities, and hospitals. The more advanced tests can be administed by The Delta Society and require that both you and your dog are tested to ensure you make a good team. 

Join A Local Therapy Dog Group: Most communities have local therapy dog organizations that serve as an umbrella for coordinating all the visits and testing of therapy dogs. For help in finding your local organization, try searching for your town name and "therapy dog."

Not every dog would enjoy being a therapy dog -- two of my dogs at home wouldn't enjoy work as therapy dogs. Nemo is a bit wary of strangers in unfamiliar circumstances and Lily is not good if other dogs are present (your dog must be good with other dogs -- and by good I mean neutral [not good as in "Let's PLAY!"]). Even Tango has his limits: one of our visits is with a class of 8 special education students who can be noisy, (unintentionally) rough, and unpredictable. One hour is Tango's maximum in that environment -- I make sure that we're there less than an hour to ensure that Tango's never pressed to his limit. So be sure to take your dog's personality and preferences into consideration when you're deciding whether to give therapy work a shot. Honor your dog. 

Get Organized!

Want to be an effective teacher to your dog? Here's a little bit of advice that will get you closer to your goal: get organized. 

I just spent an hour with an organizer -- and will spend another 2 hours on Wednesday -- getting myself and my office organized and streamlined. I had a hard time giving up an hour of my day today even though I know it's worth it. I keep thinking: I could have answered email, I could have written a blog post, I could have blah, blah, blah. Here's the real truth: I probably would have been on Twitter and Facebook if I weren't with the organizer. 

So: I now have the beginnings of a plan to get organized. Yes, it will take some time out of my schedule to implement the organizational plan, but in the end, I will actually gain hours -- and lose stress! I think the same can be said for people who are trying to teach their dog new things.

Here's my thumbnail sketch for you if you're so overwhelmed that you can't even get started with your dog (like me with my office!). 

1. What's the one thing that bugs you the most about your dog's behavior? Just one. (Write it down.)
2. What new behavior would fix that? For instance, if the one thing that bugs you the most is that your dog jumps on guests, what do you want the dog to do instead of  jumping? (Here's a hint: sit is a great replacement behavior, because if your dog is sitting he can't also be jumping.)
3. Manage your dog until you teach him the new behavior so he can't get into trouble. This means: when guests come, either leash your dog (and keep him on a short leash so he can't get close enough to jump) or put up a gate so your dog can't have access to the front door and the guest when they walk in. 
4. Teach the new behavior ("sit" in this example). Make it easy for your dog -- teach the dog when he's already had his exercise for the day, when there aren't any distractions, and use really delicious treats to show him just how great it is to sit. 
5. Systematically work in the "real life" elements like distractions and duration. (For "real life," your distractions will be the door bell ringing, your movement toward the door, the actual movement of the door opening, and the appearance of the guest. The duration will be how long the dog needs to remain sitting.)

That's it! Honestly, it really is that easy. I know, it doesn't feel that easy sitting on your side of the fence. I'm sure the organizer that left here today thought "this isn't rocket science lady, just have a place for everything and then put it there!" And really, I already knew that. I just needed someone to break it down into manageable pieces for me. 

Teaching your dog good manners is just a matter of getting organized . What seems like an insurmountable problem is really just a matter of teaching your dog a few new habits, rather than spending all your time trying to get him to stop the old habits.