Early Puppy Education
One area of Bonnie’s research involved puppies, paralleling her Master’s work in Early Childhood Education. Her staff and students began training pups earlier and earlier peaking at 3-3.5 weeks of age. Her research found that this early learning not only teaches a pup how to learn but that it makes lasting behavioral impressions in the mind of the adult dog. One pup, taught to turn on the light at seven weeks, then given no exposure to this task for six months, upon request immediately turned on the light at eight months. A similar study, a two-year period with no intervening practice, resulted in the same response. Early puppy training is now an integral part of all Institute dog training classes.
Read more about this topic: Bonnie Bergin
Famous quotes containing the words early, puppy and/or education:
““Never hug and kiss your children! Mother love may make your children’s infancy unhappy and prevent them from pursuing a career or getting married!” That’s total hogwash, of course. But it shows on extreme example of what state-of-the-art “scientific” parenting was supposed to be in early twentieth-century America. After all, that was the heyday of efficiency experts, time-and-motion studies, and the like.”
—Lawrence Kutner (20th century)
“Why does not the kitten betray some of the attributes common to the adult puss? A puppy is but a dog, plus high spirits, and minus common sense. We never hear our friends say they love puppies, but cannot bear dogs. A kitten is a thing apart; and many people who lack the discriminating enthusiasm for cats, who regard these beautiful beasts with aversion and mistrust, are won over easily, and cajoled out of their prejudices, by the deceitful wiles of kittenhood.”
—Agnes Repplier (1858–1950)
“We find that the child who does not yet have language at his command, the child under two and a half, will be able to cooperate with our education if we go easy on the “blocking” techniques, the outright prohibitions, the “no’s” and go heavy on “substitution” techniques, that is, the redirection or certain impulses and the offering of substitute satisfactions.”
—Selma H. Fraiberg (20th century)