Shelter Puppy Lends a Paw to First-Graders, Lands Forever Home in Process

A shelter puppy who was enlisted to help kids in a first-grade classroom has wound up finding a forever home as a result.

Josie was part of a litter of five puppies from South Carolina who were brought to Rags 2 Riches Animal Rescue in Pennsylvania a little over a month ago.

Within a couple of weeks, the precocious young pup found herself helping out as a classroom puppy at Hanby Elementary School where she quickly struck up a bond with the kids in her class. Josie has Brooke Hughes to thank for her arrival at Hanby and so much more besides.

Hughes is a teacher at Hanby and the brains behind the Foster Tales Puppy Therapy Program, an initiative that brings puppies from shelters across the area to schools and other businesses to support social and emotional health.

“I started fostering puppies during the pandemic, and would use the puppies in my virtual teaching lessons,” Hughes told Newsweek. “I could tell that even through a screen, these puppies were making a positive impact.” The experience had a lasting impression on Hughes. “I couldn’t stop thinking about all the wonderful benefits the puppies could bring to our students and staff,” she said.

When life began to return to normal at her school, she decided to approach the principal with a proposal for a one-day trial of having a puppy in the classroom, starting from January 2023. “Since that one-day trial, there hasn’t been many days without a puppy strolling through our halls bringing joy to everyone,” she said.

The benefits of therapy dogs in school settings are well documented. In 2023, as part of a study published in the Journal of Veterinary Behavior, 118 school leaders, teachers, school mental health professionals and researchers with experience of therapy dogs in school settings completed a survey on the positives and negatives of this kind of approach.

Respondents perceived that therapy dogs helped facilitate improvements in students’ social and learning engagement, as well as their emotional and behavioral well-being.

Hughes is a firm believer in the benefits of having foster puppies in the classroom. “They play a crucial role in supporting mental health by providing comfort, companionship, and reducing stress and anxiety levels among the students,” she said. “They also contribute to social-emotional learning by teaching empathy, responsibility, and compassion as students care for and interact with them.”

Over the course of an average school day, she said, the puppies are involved in a variety of activities “designed to integrate them into the curriculum and maximize their impact on student learning and their own socialization and development.”

Students take turns reading to the dogs and interacting with them, while teachers make efforts to incorporate the puppies into lessons throughout the day. “This not only helps to improve reading confidence but also fosters a positive and nurturing environment where students feel supported and encouraged to engage in their learning,” Hughes said.

The kids also get a chance to collaborate in the care and training of these young dogs, learning more about patience, teamwork, emotional intelligence and self-regulation in the process.

There’s another important benefit to the Foster Tales Puppy Therapy Program for dogs like Josie: the opportunity to grow used to being around people and eventually find a forever home.

The program’s track record speaks for itself. “As of today, there have been 60 puppies adopted through our classroom,” Hughes said.

That number, as it turns out, now includes Josie. Eager to spread the word about her work, Hughes regularly posted to TikTok about Josie and some of the other dogs that lend a paw. One clip of Josie in action, shared under the handle fostertalespt, has been watched over 1.2 million times.

Hughes said she posts videos “to spread the same joy that the pups bring to our classroom with my audience as well as advocate for fostering.” The video of Josie ended up having a significant impact on one elementary school counselor. “She saw her video and was inspired to adopt a puppy that has experience in a classroom that would be a good fit for an emotional support pup,” Hughes said.

When the counselor originally put in her application, she had planned on adopting a dog in the summer but after much back-and-forth, Hughes said they both realized Josie “would be a perfect fit for her.”

Now Josie is preparing for a new life where she’ll be doing the thing she loves. “She is going to train her in hopes for her to become an emotional support dog back in her happy place—schools,” Hughes said.

Hughes now hopes others will be inspired to take a chance on a foster puppy in the classroom and help a dog in need find love, support and maybe a place to call home.

Do you have funny and adorable videos or pictures of your pet you want to share? Send them to [email protected] with some details about your best friend, and they could appear in our Pet of the Week lineup.