The Puppy Place Guide to Puppies

Ellen Miles has written a companion guide to her hugely popular The Puppy Place series about the Peterson family who rescue and foster homeless dogs. Her guide includes chapters on finding the right dog for your family and where to find one, getting ready for the new puppy or dog and meeting your new friend’s basic needs of food, water, exercise and housetraining. There is a very good chapter on making it easy for your dog to be a good dog. She talks about using positive reinforcement instead of punishment: reward the good, ignore the bad. Instructions are given to teach your dog to SIT as well as instructions to teach your dog a simple trick. She includes a chapter on the importance of regular veterinary visits and what to ask the  vet. The chapter called Fun, Loving and Understanding includes a graphic called “ How to Speak Dog”. One of the main ways dogs communicate is with body language. Ellen Miles has a handy, dandy visual guide. The final chapter deals with the unexpected: a lost dog and death. Interspersed throughout the book are little vignettes from many of her Puppy Place books.

There is plenty of good information aimed at second to fourth graders and some good reminders for their parents, too.

This is another book that according to Amazon has a publication date in the future (April 1, 2013), so as of today the libraries do not have copies. It is available at the Yulupa Book Fair or online until March 17th at Scholastic/bvusd.