Barking Up The Wrong Tree

Teach Your Child To Play Nicely With Dogs

Talking of children in my little rant about aggressive dogs the other day, I feel I should try to help the parents of the awful children who torture my dog and all the other, otherwise happy and friendly, dogs in the world.

Ask
Firstly, teach your child that not all dogs are used to or like to be petted by strangers – tell them to ALWAYS ask the owner before running up and practically jumping on the unsuspecting dog that’s busy sniffing around the park. No-one knows their dog better than the owner and this gives the owner the opportunity to say no or to supervise the greeting.

Introduce Themselves
It’s natural for a child to want to pet a dog on the head straight away, but that’s not how dogs introduce themselves. A dog needs to sniff first so teach your child to hold their hand out first and keep it still, to allow the dog time to sniff them first.

Petting
When petting, a child wants to lean over and pet the top of the dog’s head, but to a dog that can be quite a threatening signal, even from a small child. In fact, a small child is even more threatening than an adult, because children move quickly and suddenly and tend to be noisier than an adult and thus less predictable from a dog’s point of view. Teach your child how to pet the dog on his back or shoulder.

Naturally, not all the onus should be on the parent of the child. A dog owner has a responsibility to properly train and socialise their dog. I reckon anyone who doesn’t should be shot, but anyway I digress. From the owner’s point of view, before the introduction, it’s a good idea to give the dog a basic command such as ‘sit’ or ‘shake a paw’ (see our article on how to train this one). Demonstrating this trick puts a child at ease – and many adults actually – but it also gets the attention of your dog so he knows that something’s happening.

p.s. The picture hasn’t exactly got anything to do with this article, but it’s cute tho eh?

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Feb 20, 2008 | 0 | Care & Training