AAT Success Stories
“Animal-Assisted Therapy is a positive experience for both the volunteers and the children. We saw increased motivation in several of our clients to work on their articulation goals. The volunteers seem to really enjoy coming and it provides an opportunity for the children to develop their social communication skills by learning how to appropriately greet the volunteers and ask questions about the animals. On days when AAT is not taking place, it is common to hear the children ask if the “puppy” is coming that day or to make comments about their experience with the dogs to staff or their parents”
- A Speech Language Pathologist working with The Chimo Project
“I worked with a seven-year-old girl with Reactive Attachment Disorder and she loved having the dog at the therapy sessions. Betweeen him and the attachment-based exercises I did with her, she eventually made a picture and wrote”I love you” for the foster mother. She had never expressed this to anyone before. This also led to her asserting herself more with her older brother, who could be quite controlling of her”
- A Mental Health Therapist working with The Chimo Project
“We have some students who attend our school only because we have a cat here. We use the cat as an incentive for positive behavior. If a student is having difficulty staying on task, we tell him/her that is they can stay focused for a certain length of time, they will get to spend some time with the cat. This works very well with our students!”
- A Youth Counsellor working with The Chimo Project
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- Here is a picture of Crash one of our Westlock Therapy dogs working. His handler pictured here has 3 Chimo dogs... http://t.co/z0lyZb8JI2
