Published: June 30, 2009 10:54 am      

Teacher's Pet: Children improve skills by reading to dogs

The Clark County Red Cross is using pet therapy in a novel way. It’s using dogs as an audience for books.

The Puppy Tales reading program allows children from the second to the fifth grade a chance to improve their reading and speaking skills by reading to a canine. The pet therapy portion of the program allows the child to read without the fear of stumbling, misreading or mispronouncing words.

“It takes the stress off the child,” said Betsy Loveland, program director for the Clark County Red Cross. “They don’t tense up and freeze.”

The kids see it a little more simply.

“I like to read to them a lot,” said 8-year-old Matthew Monroe.

When asked why, he said, “because she’s [pet therapy dog Sophie] great and she’s funny [and] because it’s easier to read to a dog than it is to read to a person.”

Matthew has read 13 books as part of the summer program and is becoming increasingly attached to Sophie, said his

mother, Angie Monroe.

“Matthew loves it,” she said. “[He] has had a speech problem. Since he was 2 he has been in speech therapy and he has been in reading therapy at school.

“So this was just something for us to keep him reading during the summer. The dogs is just kind of like an extra bonus.”

The children have started to develop a bond with the animals and they get to choose what team — a dog and a handler — they get to work with. Parents or guardians are also on hand during the reading session, but are slightly separated from the child while they are reading.

The dogs can be disarming for the nervous reader and offer emotional support to those in need.

“Dogs just give love and people just need that,” Loveland said.

Seven-year-old Hunter Leonard picked his team — Joey, a sheltie, and handler Kathi Smith. When asked why Hunter picked Joey to read to, he said, “Joey is always following me around and he’s licking me a lot.”

Hunter also said he is comfortable reading to Joey and has finished nine books during the program.

“Hunter, he can’t wait to come,” said his grandmother, Cindy Cash.

Each child is encouraged to visit his or her local library to choose books to read to the dogs.

In addition to Puppy Tales, the Red Cross’ pet therapy program makes frequent visits to hospitals, retirement homes and has another reading-based program with the animals.

“As far as I know, in this region, we are the only location with a pet therapy program,” Loveland said.

The programs are all independently funded, she said. The money comes from private donations, sales from a calendar of the pet therapy dogs, yard sales and grants.

From the program that began in 2006, pet therapy has grown to around 45 dogs and 54 owners who bring those dogs.

The Puppy Tales initiative is still in its early stages, and the decision to expand the pet therapy program was to motivate children to read, including encouraging them to visit the library more often.

“We saw where it brought so much joy to the places we would visit. We are just wanting to expand out and take our dogs to the kids,” Loveland said. “If [the parents] think it is worth their time and effort and gas, we’ll probably continue it.”