As a glossy collie-boxer cross with a very waggy tail, Willow often wins attention from passing canine lovers. In the small north Devon town where she lives, however, she is frequently stopped by parents and children for a different reason — they credit her as the dog who has changed their lives. In a recent piece of fan mail to Willow, one set of parents wrote that their son, Ben, who had been so cripplingly terrified of dogs that a family walk was impossible, was now no longer afraid of them thanks to the six-year-old rescue dog’s weekly visits to his primary school.
“Unless you’ve had a stressed child you can’t imagine the help that Ben has had from Willow,” they wrote. Another set of parents say it was Willow who helped their son, who was behind in class and getting into trouble, to enjoy school for the first time. On one Saturday walk Willow was spotted by two young siblings who had recently been moved to the school and were having a tough time settling down in a new area. They excitedly introduced Willow, their new friend, to their granny.
Willow’s owner, Jacqui Harrison, spent six months searching for the right rescue puppy before spotting her on the website The Dog Rescue Pages, which links to the details of thousands of dogs in need of a home. “She had been rescued by a dog charity in Ireland and wasn’t looking her best — she had mites and skin problems. But she was an interesting mix of breeds, and was described as being both good natured and intelligent.”
Harrison, a 43-year-old illustrator lives in Instow, says she would never have contemplated buying a puppy from a breeder when so many already need a home. She had also always harboured dreams of working with a dog. So it was a happy coincidence that, when she took Willow to training classes, the 16-week-old puppy’s potential was spotted by Tracey Berridge who runs the charity, Dogs Helping Kids (DHK).
There then followed two years of special “school” training, after which Willow began her first job at a local primary school, helping children with their reading. Harrison, a former teacher, immediately noticed that those who were struggling were able to concentrate for longer when they were reading a story to Willow and that her calming presence visibly relaxed them.
Advertisement
Willow was trained to do the “snuggle”, where she rested her chin on the child’s knee to give them extra reassurance, and to follow the pages by moving her head. “It looked for all the world as if she was listening to their every word,” says Harrison. After the 15-minute reading session, the child’s reward was to “train” Willow, helping her to learn tricks. “They’d say ‘paw, bow, high- five,’ and she’d oblige. They’d say ‘talk’ and she’d talk to them, or lie on the floor when they said ‘sleep’, which they loved.”
Willow’s best trick was “reading” flashcards. “When the child held up a sign saying, ‘SIT’ ‘DOWN’ and ‘SPIN’ she’d do it without any verbal prompts. That would amaze the children, but it had another interesting effect: they’d think, ‘Maybe, if a dog can learn to read, I can too.’ Sometimes she’d get it wrong, but they’d love that too, because they’d see that everyone makes mistakes.”
“They think, ‘Maybe if a dog can learn to read, I can too’
Two years ago Marland Day School, a secondary school in Barnstaple for boys with social, emotional and behavioural issues asked if Willow could join them for a day each week. “It can be a challenging environment, as you can imagine, with a school of highly strung teenage boys, but Willow’s presence helps ease that tension and changes the atmosphere,” says Harrison.
Willow works one-to-one with the boys; they are taught how to look after and train a dog, and in the process learn social and emotional skills themselves. “They learn they have to be kind, to show Willow respect and have patience when training her,” says Harrison. “They see how she has to keep trying and practising a new skill before she masters it. By teaching her, they’re learning lessons about themselves.
“We started doing agility training and I bought new equipment, including, a tunnel and hoops. At first Willow was freaked out by the tunnel, so we had to coax her near it with cheese until she was no longer afraid. Now she loves it and races through it any time she can. The boys could see that Willow took on a challenge and overcame it. For some of these boys, working with Willow is the first time they’ve felt they have done well at something, which builds their confidence,” says Harrison.
Advertisement
The dog’s presence can also get pupils to open up about their problems. “A lot of the boys put on a front, so they can seem intimidating, but when Willow is there she seems to help them let down their defences. Sometimes they might talk about what’s going on at home, often putting this in terms of their own dog’s behaviour. So the conversation feels as if it is more like a discussion about dogs than them.”
DHK now has 70 dogs working in UK schools, says Berridge. She has worked with children with autism and ADHD, with remarkable results. Dogs also have great success with children who have dyslexia and reading difficulties generally. “We’ve seen children’s reading go up by one or two levels in a matter of months,” she says.
“Willow’s presence can help the pupils open up about their problems
A review of 50 studies examining children reading to dogs, by the University of Lincoln, showed that it really did boost reading ability. The studies concluded that this is probably through increased motivation and self-esteem, the non-judgmental presence of a dog, plus a lowering of anxiety levels. Studies have shown a decrease in a child’s blood pressure when they are with a dog, and another, at Yale University, is measuring whether dog-child interactions can decrease a child’s level of the stress hormone cortisol.
“Dogs have this way of getting into our souls,” says Berridge. “I once took my dog Laya into a classroom of seven-year-olds. She went around sniffing all the kids and immediately homed in on one boy, put her head on his lap and didn’t move. It turned out that the boy’s dad had just died. Somehow, she just knew he needed that love and attention.”
Willow will be learning to surf for the Dog Helping Kids fundraising day on Sunday, May 14 (dogshelpingkids.co.uk)