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Music.

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I'm so... Do you want to do an intro? No, I'll do it. I'm all good.

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I love doing my intro. Are you ready? Ready?

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Three, two, one. Welcome back to another episode of Shit That Goes On In Our

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Heads. Today we have an amazing guest.

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I'm so excited to talk to Barb. Welcome.

0:41

Welcome. Welcome. So glad that I'm here. Thank you.

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Yeah. How are you today? I am very well.

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There is not so much sunshine but i am sunshine for myself so that's it.

0:55

I know it's fake spring right now

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like we had two days in the 50s and then

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it's gonna snow on monday so you know it's okay

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you know mother nature needs to mother nature needs

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to stop taking the gummies man i swear to god she has

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no idea what season we're in let's tell

1:13

her some words that's right yeah it's

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not too bad here i mean it's like gloomy but

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temperature wise it's pretty nice same here and i took

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my dog for a walk so that was cool yeah me too me too i enjoyed being outside

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crunching on the leaves with the little dog so yeah it was really therapeutic

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i told you nature is a healer but i guess i know you know what though i'm gonna

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in your defense i I know that it has been kind of crappy down there lately.

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So I didn't need you to get any sicker than you were.

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I know. I'm just recovering from COVID. From one day negative.

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That's good. That's good. Yeah. Yeah.

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And I was in quarantine, so I was slowly losing my mind.

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So it was good to be outside with the dog and like fresh air.

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And just it was it was wonderful. Yep. Just wonderful. That's good to hear that you're doing better.

2:08

Thank you. So Barb, tell us a little bit about your passion. What is it that you do?

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So I could say that I do a lot of things, but my passion is dog therapy in educational

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settings, especially for children and especially for younger children.

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But not only, and spreading awareness about what including therapy dogs in educational

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settings can potentially do for our children's well-being and academics.

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So there are a lot of things that therapy dogs, therapy dog teams can do for

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children and for teachers and for parents too, too, because we are all in this together.

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And that is really my passion and also writing about it and talking about it,

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just like I'm talking about this with you right now.

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I love this. This is by far the coolest thing ever.

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What are the age ranges for those that, you know, have benefited from this?

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So I think that the age ranges for to be able to benefit from therapy dog interaction

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with therapy dogs there is no age range because therapy dogs go to.

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Preschools they go to middle school high

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school they go to nursing homes so all together when you look at it there is

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no age limitation for that there are other kinds of limitations maybe someone

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is severely allergic to dogs but there is not much there are not many cases

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of such very very severe situations,

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but we have to take it into consideration. But there is no limitation as far as the age, definitely.

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You hear that, G-Rex? I hear that. You could benefit. Yeah.

4:00

Here's the problem is, I'm way more allergic to dogs than I am to cats.

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Okay. Really? Yeah. We have eight cats in the house, and I have to take a Zyrtec every day.

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And there's two rooms in the house that they can't come in. They can't come in my office.

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Can't come into my room but in the rest of

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the house like I if I don't take a Zyrtec I

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can't breathe but I love dogs and so I grew up with dogs my entire life right

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ever since I was like a little kid until I left the house when I was like 18

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I love dogs like we had we had a golden doodle and we had a couple of black

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labs and like I would take a dog in a heartbeat and.

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I'm old and I'm tired of dealing with my allergies. Yeah. They can take it all, right?

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I mean, I don't have allergies to animals, so I don't know much about it.

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But any kind of situation like that, it can have a negative impact on your life, right?

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But therapy dogs are not the only kinds of therapy animals.

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There are therapy, there are actually therapy dogs. There's a better way of

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saying it up to date with the terminology that's new out there.

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So animal-assisted intervention, that is what I'm doing.

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It used to be like therapy dogs or dog therapy, but now you're supposed to call

5:27

it therapy-assisted interventions.

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And there are organizations that certify other animals as well.

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So you can have cats, you can have bunny rabbits, llamas, miniature horses,

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guinea pigs, I think, too. Yeah.

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Can you please tell me that spiders and snakes don't fall into that category?

5:51

I have no idea, actually. For some people, and I don't like any kind of exclusion,

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however, there are some features of a therapy animal that have to be met.

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But i could guarantee that for people

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who have these types of animals in their houses they

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are probably very therapeutic right there is a reason why they

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have them to have a snake for me it wouldn't be maybe

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therapeutic well when i observed nature i

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went to the zoo and saw the snake in like its almost natural surroundings it

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was probably really cool to watch nature in action maybe it would be therapeutic

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but for the therapy animals they have to have therapy animal have to be We have

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to be able to respond to a handler's,

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professional's commands. So you can imagine that certain animals, spiders, probably would not be able to do this.

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Therefore, they wouldn't qualify to be animals. Sorry, spiders.

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That's awesome. Well, because I was just thinking, you know,

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like there's so many different animals. We have a friend of ours who is very attached to his cat, right? Right.

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He has he's on the spectrum, has ADHD, and he wanted to take his cat with him

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to college as his as his therapy cat.

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But after we talked about all the logistics and everything and,

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you know, the fact that he would be in school all day and, you know,

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wouldn't have the interaction. I mean, we kind of talked about it. I think in the back of his head,

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though, it's still a plan, which I'm fine with.

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You know, we both all joked about it, but it does, the cat does calm him down.

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So, yeah, the only problem is that to be able to take a cat like that to college or a dog,

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I mean, potentially this animal can live with this person and be a so-called,

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I forgot the name for this. It's not a service animal.

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It's like an emotional support. So that animal that would have to be,

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of course, documented from like a psychologist or another

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other professional in order to qualify to have

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a therapy emotional support animal living with you but

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still would not be able to take it to take this animal to

8:01

college in order to take it to college the animal

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would have to have the status of a service animal and that's a different animal

8:12

than therapy animal or emotional support animal wow yeah yeah because the service

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animal is an An animal that can go to persons with the person pretty much everywhere,

8:25

but they need to perform a certain task for that person, right?

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So it cannot be, it's just, I just feel good in the presence of my animal.

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That is not a task that the animal does for you to be able to be called a service dog.

8:45

How did you get into this? Like, how did this start for you?

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It started really, we never had a plan to become therapy dog team or anything like that.

8:56

It really started, I think the start happened when my daughter was around 10

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years old and we never had a dog as a family and she wanted to have an animal.

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And we knew that it would be a dog because I had a dog in the past,

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my husband had a dog in the past. So it would be a dog but and we

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decided it's time she's already old enough

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to be able to have a dog just i

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had some more time on my hands a little bit too i

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think and we decided i think that we have some time and

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a child grew up i think now i

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tried to find a dog and we didn't

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know what type of dog we like okay

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like me and my daughter we want a white

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poodle we just like white poodles that's it my husband

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then i want to put all those it's like how do you

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compromise maybe let's get a

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dog that looks a little bit like a poodle but it's not exactly poodle and it's

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not white okay let's do it so we started investigate and we found out about

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those barber doodles and then wait a minute there's also golden doodles what's

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that so we started reading about these mixtures of breeds.

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And eventually we found a breeder

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online and she had some available golden doodles. One of them was Carmel.

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We just saw her in the picture and right away, oh my gosh, we must have this

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dog. Is this dog still available?

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And that was in Rochester, New York. And we went and got Carmel.

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She became a part of our family and she was growing.

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She was about six months old and she

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became very strong i never had an experience with her

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i mean she is 68 pounds i

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never had a dog of this size they can

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get so strong when they are like six

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months old seven months old because they're growing already big

10:50

and they have to take

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your dog for a walk obviously right but it

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was like it became impossible to do it she was

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so strong just to use was a collar

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she was just so cool she would be just pulling so

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hard i was afraid i would just like damage her

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neck or something it was just horrible because i mean she's essentially a hunting

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dog right it's uh she's a poodle and it's golden retriever maybe not all of

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them are like that but she really was and she still is right now and then you

11:24

do you can't take your own dog for a to walk.

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I started looking around for trainers in the area to turn to a trainer and just

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ask, what do I do? I had no idea what to do.

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And it was very hard to find anybody. But I finally got a hold of someone in

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the area and I found out she has some experience.

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And I called her and she says, you know what?

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I see you really have a really hard time with this dog. I would be willing to

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come and show you a couple of things, maybe like once or twice,

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and some of them will really help you.

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So that's what happened. She came over and she started us on a type of harness,

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I guess that's called, it's called Gentle Leader, like Carmel's mouth around.

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And you would also go behind the head.

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I mean, she knew how to do this. she had experience with

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this type of harness and what happened was just amazing

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once we started using it the

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first time carmel started walking

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by my leg on the side instantly

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there was no more pulling i was like i can't believe this is happening then

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she came the second time and then she says you know what it would be good for

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you to do more obedience training so she was Giving those types of trainings,

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we sign up for the classes. Then during the class, I remember when she says, you know what,

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this dog is amazing. I mean, she needs some more training, but she would be an amazing therapy dog.

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And then we went to, for Canine Good Citizen, which is like the next step of

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training before you become therapy dog. And then just before we knew, another type of training happened,

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therapy dog training and with the certification. And that's really how it happened.

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In 2007, 2018, we became certified.

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So that's how it happened. It literally happened just like I described in one

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of my books that I published, From Unruly to Therapy Dog.

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That's what really happened. but she was totally unruly didn't listen

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i bought i bought some books about training

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the dog but it's totally different game i mean

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with the experienced trainer it's just

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different yeah as opposed

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to reading a book about dog training you might

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get a couple tricks couple commands that might

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work but it's just not the same and

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so that training good training is so incredibly

13:59

really important for any dog owner I think any kind of breed I don't think there

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are too many dogs there are just like perfect right right cool so it sounded

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like with training you started to maybe see Carmel in a different light how

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did you incorporate her with kids and learning.

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So at the beginning we just started incorporating her

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without any kind of experimentation so much but

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it was really through the conversation with the teacher and so I got connected

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to the teacher I would have a conversation well how do you think we could do

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this right what do you need in the classroom is it with a group of children

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you would like to do it no I would like Carmel to come and,

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interact with my whole classroom but I don't want the teaching to be stopped

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maybe for a little bit at the beginning right when the dog is introduced to

14:52

the group of kids but then can we make a part part of classroom period when

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we still do the teaching and learning but she somehow is a part,

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so it's like how do you do it well okay i can

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come in and that's what i would i would come in with her and

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i would just go around the classroom with her and we would stop at the desks

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and then when we stop the child gets changed to pet carmel talk to her whatever

15:16

but everybody's still learning raising their hands and that's really how it

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started and we're doing it to this day in some some of the classes.

15:26

But then in more like a special education group of kids, there was a little

15:31

bit different situation there. We would like interact without teaching. The teacher was able to take like a

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10 or 15 minutes out of teaching and they will interact with Carmel.

15:41

And then we would split the kids. And let's say two of them would get a chance

15:45

to take Carmel with me for a walk in the school, just around the school in the

15:50

hallways. They really loved it. So I would take like, I would bring another extra leash. I would hold one leash,

15:57

they would hold another, and this would be called, I am walking Carmel, right?

16:01

I am walking Carmel in the school.

16:04

And they loved it because they would talk to other people in the hallways.

16:08

They would like introduce me and I got a chance to walk Carmel.

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It was just really awesome for them. It gave them a chance of like taking some

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responsibility, right? Helping with walking the dog.

16:21

So that was awesome. But then like around three years ago, I started collaborating

16:28

with this one incredible teacher, Lucinda.

16:32

And then we even had remote therapy during COVID, which was very difficult technologically

16:40

because kids were at homes. Lucinda was in school and I was in my home.

16:46

So we try, I don't even know to this day how exactly she did it.

16:52

This connection happened it was totally different it

16:56

was a different game I mean there's no doubt about

16:59

it but those kids loved it

17:02

it was the highlight of the week for them Carmel comes they're going to see

17:06

Carmel on the video awesome I would talk a little bit about different things

17:11

it was just a little bit different type of interaction parents would see Carmel

17:16

too on the screens of course as well they loved it.

17:20

And then I remember after the pandemic was over, kids went back to school.

17:26

And I started seeing just like really low levels of writing of anything really

17:31

in children, right? We all know what happened.

17:34

And we started thinking, maybe we can do something more with Carmel.

17:39

Like we can experiment with some activities.

17:43

And we just started in a very simple way.

17:46

We asked children like how is

17:49

carmel kind how does she show kindness what does she do

17:52

and the kids are just everybody wanted to

17:55

talk about how carmel shows kindness they all wanted to

17:57

describe and then we asked them awesome well

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can you use what you've

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learned from carmel about being kind and do

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something for your family or for your friends at

18:10

school knowing that dogs do do different certain

18:13

things in a different way because there are dogs right and people are

18:16

right so we had conversations about these differences too

18:19

but it was amazing what they said about

18:22

what they think they've learned and how they can apply it

18:25

to their family lives school lives and also

18:29

my collaborator teacher lucinda noticed that usually children

18:33

some children would raise their hands and tell

18:35

the answers and others would just like not say

18:38

anything or just well i've got the same answer right but in

18:42

this situation because they were so already attached to the

18:45

dog they love carmel they all wanted to

18:48

participate because it was about their dog had.

18:53

Something to say every child so

18:56

that was amazing too big policy and then and then we started doing something

19:00

different more like literacy activities i kids were learning about visualization

19:05

visualization in language arts and I started reading my book about how we became Therapy Dog Team.

19:15

So again, they were listening to me reading, this is about Carmel,

19:20

the dog we know, the dog who comes to our classroom.

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And then like, wow, Cinda, our teacher is already in this book,

19:28

is also in this book. They're like, wow, this is really cool.

19:31

And they were asking me, well, you published this book? Yeah, I published this book.

19:36

I'm like, yeah, anybody can publish the book. And they're like,

19:39

wow. Now, I am an educator, right? This is my profession.

19:43

But in this classroom, I was just a therapy dog handler, Carmel's friend who brought Carmel.

19:49

I was not a teacher for them. So they were learning from me as learning from Carmel's friend.

19:56

Learning from Carmel and Carmel's mom who brings Carmel to the classroom.

20:00

That's how it was. It was a totally different connection.

20:04

Connection with me not as the teacher at all. so

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that's another interesting thing that kids like to learn

20:10

from others who are not teachers no already is in

20:13

teaching it's so true right that's really

20:16

what happens and we have to take advantage of this really and

20:20

i remember when i told them well okay now i'm

20:23

going to read a scene from the book and you're

20:26

going to close your eyes and you're going to imagine this

20:29

whole scene that i'm reading about and they

20:33

close their eyes i remember how they all closed their eyes was so serious

20:35

about it when i look around the classroom all the eyes

20:39

were closed there's no question about it and then

20:41

i'm reading and then when i was done with the reading i

20:44

asked him what did you see what did you imagine again everybody

20:48

wants to say what they imagine and it

20:52

was very interesting they imagine everything that i

20:55

had in that scene written the description and

20:59

they added more details like they almost like

21:02

developed the scene into something more and telling

21:06

them what you are incredible you could be incredible writers because

21:10

you could help any writer if you

21:13

can help me in making my the scene

21:16

in my book better i wish i had you.

21:19

But i wasn't reading the book because you wouldn't help

21:22

me write this book and i seriously

21:25

it was just i was just so amazed and then

21:28

i kept reading the book and that's how

21:31

the idea of them trying to write books

21:34

as well happened they just started to ask me

21:37

do you think we could write books too of course you can write books too we can

21:42

help you with that and that's how this project started but i have to say one

21:47

thing when i came back to the classroom i remember this visualization activity

21:52

and you were something was is going on in the classroom.

21:56

And Lucinda says, well, can we just do regular therapy,

22:01

Everybody pets Carmel and that's it, new literacy. And that's what we did.

22:06

But after a while, kids were like, wait a minute, we want to do visualization with Carmel.

22:13

Like they really wanted to do literacy activities with the dog, with Carmel.

22:18

And we had no idea that they would really love it that much.

22:22

Yeah. Yeah. It reminds me of when I first took my son, very first time to go to the dentist.

22:29

Yeah. I am one of those people that like, I'm definitely afraid to go to the

22:32

dentist. Like it's going to take everything in me to convince myself to go.

22:37

But I'm very, like, I don't want my fears to impact him.

22:42

So I had done some research and was looking around in the area that we lived

22:46

in at the time to find a dentist. And I stumbled upon one that had a therapy dog and it was specific for kids.

22:52

So you could book certain days that she would be there.

22:55

And it was a golden doodle as well. And that was literally what we did.

22:59

And the dog just was, she would stay by his side and he could pet her throughout his whole thing.

23:05

And I don't know, it was just cool to see him engaged in something other than,

23:09

you know, the boring stuff that was happening.

23:12

So I think that's, I love pet therapy. Yeah, that's amazing.

23:14

So you can see the dogs, other therapy animals they can pet in places.

23:19

Places it's just there's something and that's why this has such an incredible

23:23

impact on kids who have just trouble with focusing to begin with and any other

23:30

all kinds of disabilities and then when the dog comes in.

23:34

They just want to behave so well because they don't want the dog to see them as behaving that well.

23:43

They want to be inviting for the dog to come back.

23:46

And to the point where some kids who have behavioral plans, they really have a lot of issues.

23:55

And without implementing those behavioral plans, you cannot teach them,

23:59

you cannot teach the group. But when I come with my dog,

24:04

these kids don't need those behavioral plans they

24:07

immediately focus on the dog and especially if

24:10

you don't incorporate the dog in a very like creative

24:13

way these children all of

24:16

a sudden become creative they don't

24:19

cause any behavioral issues and everything is

24:22

changing like magic and it's unbelievable because when

24:26

i came to the smoke reveal math group with

24:29

kids who just have really big issues with math they hate

24:32

math they don't like going to this remedial math group right obviously but they

24:38

just it just totally changed their attitude to math just the presence of the

24:43

dog and doing something cool that involves play some movement and math and then this math becomes.

24:52

Something not that actually difficult to do yeah how i believe it's like hey

24:58

it's like the puppy happy days we used to have at work. Do you remember those,

25:02

Jira? Yeah, I remember those. I mean, it just, it helps with the anxiety, right?

25:06

I know that like being around animals, just, it helps with the anxiety and I

25:11

can see how that would help the kids, right?

25:13

Because, you know, little kids, they are full of energy.

25:18

Like I would like to bottle up their energy and sell it to anybody over the age of 50.

25:23

But I can see like when, like when we're

25:26

at the zoo or when we're like someplace out

25:29

in the park and you just see all these little kids

25:32

just like congregate around the dogs and it

25:36

just has such a calming effect on them I can see how that would be so awesome

25:40

to have in a school environment because have a really hard time articulating

25:45

what they're feeling and by

25:47

having you know having a dog or a cat or a lizard or a frog or whatever,

25:53

something that they can touch and feel.

25:56

And that is not the same as them.

25:59

It has a very calming effect about them. And I think what you're doing is so amazing.

26:05

Yeah, it's like thinking about it.

26:08

If I go back to school and like the most boring subjects ever,

26:12

if I had something positive to associate it to, I would have retained all that information.

26:17

You know what I mean? You can imagine how many children are struggling with

26:22

math, but then there's also the aspect of anxiety.

26:25

And I'm trying to figure it out. And I have these questions too.

26:29

Like why do you think this is working like that why

26:32

does it have such an effect and i think that here

26:35

is carmel so the schools are

26:38

kind of not always inviting spaces for children i mean you have teachers you

26:43

have psychologists but these are strangers to be honest right these are not

26:50

like friends for children i mean there are a lot of teachers for amazing teachers

26:54

And they are true friends. They want nothing but the best for children.

26:59

But they still struggle. They struggle with children's anxiety.

27:03

They don't know what to do. I mean, what are you going to do when the kid's

27:07

anxiety prevents them from learning? What are you going to do?

27:11

Send them to a psychologist? Well, that's another adult they will have to deal with. And it's not going to

27:17

provide any calming effect in any way, unfortunately.

27:20

I mean, they are specialists and they help. but it's not

27:23

going to change the situation for

27:26

the child to the point where they can actually learn the

27:29

only thing they can make

27:32

a big difference is to introduce someone an animal that doesn't judge and it's

27:39

amazing how you just can't fool kids right you just can't fool kids if you don't

27:44

if they don't have the front next to them real friends they're going to still

27:49

feel anxiety There is nothing friendly,

27:51

nothing that can feel like, you know, I have to tell you, I remember one point

27:56

when I brought Carmel to, I think it was third grade.

28:00

That was the grade in which we did the book and the visualization.

28:03

And the book is based on this teachers and therapy dog teams.

28:07

And I remember this girl, my dog was sitting and this girl just like almost

28:12

like laid down on the floor because she wanted to touch Carmel's white paw with

28:21

her cheek and like feel it. I was like, what does that mean for a child who...

28:28

Put his cheek on Carmel's fur just

28:31

to like feel it like this is something different

28:34

and it's craving for something that's warm

28:37

yeah fuzzy has no judgment and

28:41

how about this at one point I remember that

28:44

I had no idea about this at that time because

28:47

you know as a therapy dog handler I come into the classroom and

28:51

I cannot know a lot about these children because there's confidentiality right

28:55

right i can know that maybe some have issues but that's really all but this

29:00

one child did not speak oh wow non-verbal yeah totally non-verbal not speaking.

29:10

And carmel and one time carmel

29:13

came in and my teacher told me

29:15

about it i wasn't aware of this and carmel like

29:18

touched him with her nose or something that he thought it

29:21

was really funny and that's the carmel you came

29:24

to see me this is oh i love you so much carmel

29:27

and that was the time when the teacher heard this child speak for the first

29:34

time wow yeah wow so you can imagine how many schools in every school there's

29:39

probably at least a couple or kids like that do speak right wow,

29:46

That's wonderful. I love Carmel. I mean, I love pet therapy.

29:50

I love the whole thing behind it. I can see benefit from it for sure.

29:54

And I mean, that's amazing. I think what you do is amazing.

29:59

Thank you. And there is a lot of other teams who do the same thing.

30:02

And I mean, this is all voluntary work, right? We don't get compensated for this.

30:07

Many of us work full time. But the the

30:10

question is like why do these therapy teams

30:13

do this well because they see these yeah

30:16

there's a benefit and and it when you

30:19

see something good instantly it makes you

30:22

feel good too so there is like a call of goodness yeah

30:26

that's wonderful i could

30:29

see where it would be even beneficial to like big

30:32

corporations to you know have like a

30:36

therapy dog day you know we all get so

30:38

wrapped up up in like what we do on our day-to-day stuff that

30:42

you know it's hard to

30:44

pull away but seeing it from my kids eyes

30:47

like how freaking cool is that right like

30:50

you go to school and you get to see a dog and then you get to like tell a story

30:54

about the dog and I just think it's the coolest thing and are there more schools

31:00

doing this now or is this relatively new so I have to say that this This is

31:06

not something that's only what we're doing here in the United States.

31:10

But obviously, the United States is kind of a leader in this area, I would think. I think.

31:15

I don't know if I can say it. Because just there's more therapy dogs here and

31:19

more therapy dog organizations and all that.

31:22

But there are many schools that never saw a therapy dog in the United States.

31:27

So this is not something that happens in every school in this country.

31:31

It just doesn't. And for...

31:35

Whatever reason, people in the school, just administration, teachers,

31:38

maybe they don't know the benefits. They don't have the access to therapy dogs. They didn't know how to get started.

31:45

The whole field of therapy dogs, as far as professional development,

31:51

organizations that would help in getting answers, is only starting.

31:58

There is an organization that provides courses, mini-conferences.

32:02

There is a mini conference in which I'm going to participate February 29th,

32:08

and that's going to be specifically for people, administrators,

32:12

schools who would like to start this practice, but they don't know how,

32:16

they don't know what to do. So that is, and I belong to some therapy dog groups on Facebook,

32:24

and I see occasionally a post principal, let's say, saying, I just don't know what to do anymore.

32:30

More kids there's so much anxiety there's so much

32:33

trouble so i'm here in this group and you

32:36

guys can you help me tell me how we can

32:39

start this what can we do to bring therapy animals

32:42

to the school because it's just like

32:45

i can't deal with this anymore we have to do something different right

32:49

literally yeah so i think this field

32:52

is developing more and there's more and more awareness awareness

32:55

and and also in the world i

32:58

just i know there's even there's therapy dogs in

33:01

in india there's there are therapy dogs and i know

33:04

someone who does she has her own therapy dog in

33:07

a very small country of malta which is right under

33:10

sicily in europe it happens everywhere

33:14

almost i'm sure there are countries that don't even didn't probably even hear

33:21

about this at all but it's you know it definitely is taking the lead in this

33:25

area but we don't want this to be this way we want this to really be more and more common in the world.

33:33

Yeah, for sure. Like I can see this really like benefiting kids like in inner

33:38

city schools or, you know, or in the like underprivileged schools.

33:43

You know, I see a lot of anxiety from that. And I think what you're doing is so incredible.

33:49

It really is. I wish I'd had therapy dogs when I was going to school. Yeah, I wish too. Same.

33:57

It's well, we can't turn the clock, right?

34:01

We cannot change the past, but we can definitely, that's why I'm doing what

34:05

I'm doing because just seeing, and I mean, there are some incredible stories

34:10

such as the child starting to talk, right?

34:12

But even every time I come in, when you see the smiles on children's faces.

34:18

When I enter with carmel all of a sudden everybody

34:21

looks different not saying that school or

34:25

that's the lesson that was occurring brought them

34:28

down but it's a totally different face expression

34:31

and even on the teacher's faces too it's so

34:35

different feelings when you enter with the dog it

34:37

just changes everything there is a lot of positive

34:41

chemicals and hormones that everybody yeah the

34:43

the energy yeah and energy changes and the

34:47

kids maybe some think that

34:50

the dog like that would bring maybe destruction to

34:53

what you're teaching if the teacher is

34:56

not willing to try something new that

35:00

will prevent them from trying this obviously they'll just

35:03

do whatever they're doing right they'll think oh i'm

35:06

not gonna do anything like that i'm just i'm going to i'm

35:09

not going to be able to cover what i have to cover with

35:12

teaching i don't want the dog in the

35:15

classroom it's going to be a destruction but it's not the other they have to

35:20

be willing to try yeah they you have to be willing to try there's no doubt about

35:24

it and the teacher with whom i work she is like that it's like i will try let's

35:30

try something new yeah you have to do this yeah.

35:35

I love that. I love that. Well, thank you for sharing your story. Of course.

35:39

I'm excited to actually dig in online and see what I can do for my son's school

35:44

because I feel like he would benefit crazy good from this.

35:47

So yeah, I'm going to look into it and I just appreciate your story and what you do.

35:51

I'm glad you're sharing that because I would imagine, I think if I had any kind

35:57

of advice of like how to start with the school, definitely equip yourself with

36:01

some knowledge in this area, right?

36:04

What kind of benefits are available?

36:07

And also that there are ways of making this work because there are some parents,

36:13

teachers, or children who cannot literally interact with the dog for a variety

36:17

of reasons and most people have allergies. Allergies, there is ways of minimizing those issues to make sure that everybody is included.

36:25

And therapy dog is not something that you force people into.

36:31

It's to be all kinds of considerations to be in place.

36:35

But there is organization that I can always share with you that has materials

36:42

and resources for people like that.

36:44

Administrators like to start this, but just don't know how.

36:49

Yeah. And one last time, can you tell us the name of your book?

36:53

So my latest book in which I describe more like innovative characteristics of

36:59

this practice, that's Teachers and Therapy Dogs, Innovative Collaborations to

37:04

Make a Difference for Children. Okay. It is available on Amazon. That's the one who has a description of how we started

37:12

this innovation, the whole history of this.

37:15

And then I also include lesson plans for writing lessons that include therapy

37:21

dogs and also math lessons, too.

37:25

That is so cool. I'm thinking even if I couldn't get to school to do it,

37:30

we have two dogs upstairs. And there's going to be a time where I got to do homework with him.

37:35

I know he's six now, but I'm like, I can do this. Yeah. At least try something new.

37:40

Yeah. Because like, I mean, even at home, you can like use your dog's cable,

37:46

depending on what you feed your dog. And use it for like bath manipulators or things like that.

37:51

Right. So anything that you can like connect to what your child likes.

37:57

And if they connect it to something really well and deeply, boy,

38:02

it changes the way they learn. My god that's what we see with math I remember one time after the math activity

38:10

I'm telling Lucinda wait a minute these kids are so good are they really weak

38:15

in math I'm like yeah so good because you are here with Carmel.

38:19

Take Carmel away and they're like math sucks bring Carmel back math is great

38:25

they know that next week Carmel will be here so they have participation and

38:30

the teacher can make here's another thing I mean I'm,

38:34

I don't go there every day. I go like once a week.

38:37

But the teacher was able to make those connections.

38:40

And during her teaching without us there, she would make connections to Carmel.

38:45

It's like, that's good. When she said, the kids are telling me we have to be

38:50

really patient because Carmel is very patient and we need to learn from her.

38:54

So she would make references and connection to Carmel even when we were not

39:00

there and they would still learn. That is so cool. So, Dr. Barb, I have a couple of questions for you, for our listeners.

39:10

And to just put in our show notes, are there organizations that,

39:14

you know, listeners can look into maybe for their own good or something that

39:19

they could present to their local school district? Yes.

39:23

So there is an organization that I just mentioned.

39:26

This organization provides professional development, can point school districts

39:31

to ways of starting this practice.

39:34

It's called Association of Animal Assisted Intervention Professionals.

39:41

That's the name of it. A triple A-I-P.

39:46

So they offer courses. They offer many online conferences.

39:52

So this is a really cool organization to start with.

39:55

There are also, and there are many of them, therapy dogs, organizations that certify therapy dogs.

40:03

I belong to Therapy Dogs International, but there are also other ones.

40:09

Pet Partners is another big therapy dogs organization, and they certify other

40:15

animals, not only therapy dogs.

40:18

There is Alliance of Therapy Dogs, too. So I just mentioned three big therapy dog organizations.

40:26

But the first one, Association of Animal Assisted Intervention Professionals,

40:31

they can certify animals, too, to become therapy dogs.

40:35

But they do so much more. Like I said, they offer courses, all kinds of information, many conferences.

40:43

That's really a good place to start, I think. Okay. Thank you.

40:48

Thank you so much. You're welcome.

40:51

Yeah. And this one, Association of Animal Assisted Intervention Professionals,

40:56

they have a mini conference on February 29th.

41:00

And if someone would like to find out how to start therapy, animal assisted

41:07

intervention in their school district, and if they're not a member of this organization,

41:12

it's $29, I think, to just register and participate. So I don't think the The fee is very big.

41:18

The kind of information that someone can learn really through participation.

41:23

And it's online. So that's just so convenient because you don't have to go in. Right. Right. Amazing.

41:29

Awesome. Thank you so much again, Barb. I appreciate your time,

41:32

sharing your story, giving us something to think about for what's new.

41:36

Yes. And other things we can try. Thank you so much because having me here and

41:41

being able to chat with you, that also helps me in spreading this awareness. further.

41:47

That is my mission. And even I make it a part of my job as a college professor.

41:52

They know me for this now more than I present about it at the university too. So.

42:04

Yeah, why not? I know. Yeah.

42:08

I think that to be honest with you, it probably this mission

42:11

kind of helped me in on this job this

42:14

job can be complex because it's

42:17

teaching it's service and it's research just kind

42:21

of infusing my job with this mission this passion

42:24

kind of helped me in making my job

42:27

something that i can like again yeah

42:31

right i love that okay thank you so much thank you bye all thank you so much

42:39

for listening to this episode I'm G-Rex and I'm Dirty Skittles don't forget

42:44

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42:49

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42:55

Music.