School For The Dogs Podcast

James Joyce said that Catholicism means "Here comes everybody." But does "everybody" mean our Yorkiepoos, too? Earlier this month, Pope Francis made the remark that "many, many couples do not have children because they do not want to, or they have just one – but they have two dogs, two cats… Yes, dogs and cats take the place of children [...] And this denial of fatherhood or motherhood diminishes us, it takes away our humanity." Annie, who is not Catholic, wondered if this pooh-poohing of pet ownership was echoing the church's stance on our relationships with non-human animals, or if maybe the Pope was going rogue. So, she called her friend Dan Gallagher, a professor of Classics at Cornell University. Professor Gallagher is uniquely qualified to discuss this topic: He used to be one of the Pope's secretaries and translators. He also grew up breeding Cocker Spaniels, and once gave a funeral to a hamster. He and Annie discuss some of the Catholic church's past champions of animals -- from Saint Francis of Assis

Dog parks aren't appropriate for every dog, and urban dog parks have their own unique challenges--a revolving population and small foot prints, to name a few. If Annie had her way, all dogs parks would have life guards! She gives some reasons why you might think twice before bringing just any dog to any dog park. If you've decided the dog park might be a good thing for your dog, take some tips from Annie's partner Kate Senisi, a trainer with an expertise in working with high-arousal urban dogs. Annie shares Kate's top eight tips, and adds a few of her own. This episode talks about how to enter the park, what to bring, signs it may be time to leave, and more.  This episode offers special thanks to Alexandra Messiter, who, along with her dog Cooper, has been students at SFTD since 2019. Alexandra and her husband gave a generous donation to our Scholarship Fund recently, and we are so appreciative!  "I felt moved to donate mostly because Cooper (who we adopted from Bideawee in 2019) is just so awesome - he's suc

Introducing a new series: Best Pet Ever! Wherein Annie talks to interesting people about their interesting pets. Inspired by Betty White's 1970s show, The Pet Set, Annie interviews one of her closest friends, Jessica Vitkus. Jessica is an East-Village based writer and TV producer — she was Annie's boss ten years ago on the Animal Planet show, Too Cute: Puppies and Kittens. Jessica, her kids and her partner Stephen recently got a pair of Guinea Pigs. Jessica talks about the world of Guinea Pig rescue, Guinea Pig Pavlovian Conditioning, and about how rodents may be an underused tool in couples therapy. Like this podcast? You can support us by leaving a review on iTunes and/or shopping at StoreForTheDogs.comFollow us on Instagram:  @schoolforthedogs @annie.grossman---Partial Transcript:Jessica Vitkus:I didn't expect Guinea pigs to be so fun and funny and comical. They are ridiculous furry potatoes in appearance. But also their behavior. A Guinea pig learns that a knife on a cutting board means maybe there's food

School For The Dogs' Behavior Therapy Trainer Jen Nastanski came to work at our New York-based facility after two decades of working with dogs at professional and competitive levels. She tells Annie about getting trained to be a trainer at PetSmart, getting involved in competitive Obedience using positive-reinforcement-based techniques, teaching (and helping to raise) guide dogs, and, most recently working at New York City's ASPCA, working to enrich the lives of dogs seized and held in custody by the NYPD. Special guest on this episode: Annie's friend Melanie Friedson, mom to Bichpoo, Herschel Stanley. Like this podcast? Leave a review on iTunes at http://schoolforthedogs.com/listen Need help leaving a review? See here: https://www.schoolforthedogs.com/subscribe/Shop with us at http://storeforthedogs.comSupport us by shopping with us online at storeforthedogs.comBook a session with Jen at http://schoolforthedogs.com/jen or call 212-353-3647---Partial Transcript:Annie:Can I include your funny dog voice on the

While doing the NYC's annual workplace Sexual Harassment Prevention course, Annie noted that people are being told to assume that many things other than the word "No" may mean "No."  This might be a good thing, but it's also potentially confusing! In the world of dogs, she's seen how the word "No" can also be a confusing concept, as it is frequently used ineffectively, and can even end up positively reinforcing some behaviors. She thinks about how, for both dogs and humans, this confusion about "No" can lead to stress. What if, with both dogs and humans, the focus were not on explaining what not to do, but rather on teaching what appropriate behaviors can be engaged in instead? Maybe men, in particularly, could learn something by taking discussion-starting tips from "Linda Richman," the Mike Myers "Coffee Talk" character from Saturday Night Live in the nineties. ("Talk amongst yourselves: I'll give you a topic. Discuss!")Annie goes into how it's possible to condition a secondary punisher to make the word "No"

Spencer Williams, the founder and CEO of Bozeman, Montana-based company West Paw, grew up on a working ranch where the dogs slept outside, worked hard, and, when they played, they did so with sticks. And... they were happy! Some twenty-odd years ago, he decided he wanted to help modern non-working dogs be that happy too, and wanted to do so in a way that wouldn't just improve doggie lives: It'd also improve the community and the earth. Those weren't small goals! Annie talks about the origins of this interesting company, whose guaranteed-for-life, recyclable, made-in-the-USA products have been sold at School For The Dogs in Manhattan and at storeforthedogs.com for nearly a decade. Learn how they became a "B-Corp" and what that means, in addition to finding out about some of their innovative products, materials, and practices.  Find West Paw products in our online shop: https://storeforthedogs.com/collections/west-paw-designs Like this podcast? Tell your friends! And leave us a review on iTunes! http://schoolfo

A School For The Dogs Instagram Reel that was meant to help dog owners understand how to tell if a trainer is a "positive reinforcement" trainer or not resulted in a battle in the comments section about what kind of dog training methods are best. Annie considers how the very title of "positive reinforcement dog trainer" is problematic, and talks about how the conversation led her to consider the possibility that maybe the divide between dog trainers comes down to expectations about what we want dogs to do and how emotionally resilient we think they may be.   Other episodes mentioned in this episode: What is good dog training?  https://www.schoolforthedogs.com/podcasts/episode-2-what-is-good-dog-training/ Don't chase your cat around the house with the Christmas tree: On the TikTokers who are "traumatizing" their cats in order to spare their holiday decorations https://anchor.fm/dogs/episodes/Dont-chase-your-cat-around-the-house-with-the-Christmas-tree-On-the-TikTokers-who-are-traumatizing-their-cats-in-order-t

Earlier this week, TikTok user @becs.richards posted a video of herself chasing her cat around her house while holding her Christmas tree like a bayonet; in the text that goes with the video, she explains that she saw a TikTok explaining that if you traumatize your cat with your Christmas tree before you put it up, the cat will leave the tree alone. The video and a few follow ups (showing that the cat hasn't attacked the tree) have gotten over thirty million views and four million likes. Annie meditates on the strange way that this example of punishment-based training -- billed as unvarnished traumatization -- is so funny and intriguing to the masses. Would a dog being traumatized get so many hundreds of thousands of "likes?" Beyond that, she ponders how weird it is that we expect cats to NOT want to interact with a tree in the house, and suggests some practical ways to keep pets from messing with holiday directions (spoiler alert: Get a menorah!). The video by @becs.richards that has gotten 30 million views

It costs a lot to run a small business in New York City, which can be a conundrum for a mission-driven business like School For The Dogs. Annie talks about some of the ways that she and Kate have worked to offer services and goods at prices that can make "Good Dog Training" accessible to everyone, and what it means to "shop small" in a world when the little guys are selling products that can so often be purchased at big-box stores or on Amazon. Listen up for information on SFTD's Black Friday sale -- including an exclusive discount for podcast listeners interested in on-demand courses. Annie also talks about the School For The Dogs Scholarship Fund, and mentions a special gift all donors to the fund will be offered between now and the end of the year. Lastly: She shares a poem written and read by the late Jimmy Stewart, about loving, and losing a cherished canine best friend. Mentioned in this episode:  Our online shop: http://storeforthedogs.com The Revol crate by Diggs! The price of this crate will be going

A bunch of media outlets have recently done stories about private dog runs in NYC, and have mentioned School For The Dogs' School Yard sessions, which are playtimes for dogs. School Yard is members-only, by-appointment and trainer-supervised. Annie talks about why the service is so special, and also why it's so expensive. She addresses some of the negative feedback she's gotten to the articles. She also discusses how she plans to train with her dog, Poppy, while visiting family, and suggests ways in which people can approach training a timid dog in new places or with new people over the holidays. Follow School For The Dogs on Instagram: http://instagram.com/schoolforthedogsFollow Annie on Instagram: http://instagram.com/annie.grossmanLearn more about School Yard here: https://www.schoolforthedogs.com/services/school-yard/Products mentioned in this episode are all available Storeforthedogs.com!  Also come shop with us at our storefront in Manhattan at 92 E. 7th Street. Revol dog crate: https://storeforthedogs.

Annie is joined by School For The Dogs apprentice Leeyah Wiseman to discuss two super important behaviors: Touch and find it. She and Annie discuss the benefits of teaching these two things and talk about why both behaviors are such great starting places for many dogs and their humans. Check out @schoolforthedogs' Reels on Instagram to see Leeyah demo both! Annie also engages in some time travel, reading a letter that Dr. Andrew Luescher, a veterinary behaviorist at Purdue University, wrote more than fifteen years ago. It was addressed to National Geographic, which had asked him to review their show, The Dog Whisperer, before it was released... Based on what happened next, it seems like no one read it. http://beyondcesarmillan.weebly.com/andrew-luescher.htmlSee the Illuminaughtii episode on Cesar Millan at https://youtu.be/ENl5RTBResYor find it on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/1Ygtrku55i49RA0HxxPVPGFind Leeyah on Instagram: http://instagram.com/galdogtrainingFind Annie on Instagram: http://instagr

Right after getting a pandemic puppy, Tiffany Chen decided to see if she could build some sort of side hustle in order to get her out of the corporate world. She signed up for the Virtual Assistant Internship and learned that it's wise to pick a niche. While she was working on learning about training her own dog (and building his requisite Instagram persona) she started following a lot of positive reinforcement dog trainers. It occurred to her that maybe she could use her virtual assistant powers to help them improve their marketing. She and Annie discuss how fun the R+ dog training movement is on Instagram, talk about ways to help trainers build their followings, and think aloud together about some of the overlap between training dogs and how social media's efforts to train us.Follow Pawsistant on Instagram @pawsistantFollow Annie on Instagram @annie.grossmanFollow School For The Dogs on Instagram @schoolforthedogsAlso mentioned in this episode:  @misunderstoodmutt @fromdusktilldog @k9fuel_ @doginspired http

Annie's life has two speeds right now. You'll find her physically trapped underneath her two young daughters using a suite of remote treat dispensers to train her dog, or she's at a local co-working space in a tiny room alone, talking to herself. In this bonus episode, on the one-year anniversary of her beloved dog Amos passing, she is in the latter mode, recording a kind of phone call to her late father, who she thinks would've enjoyed learning what she's learned about the Youtube star Blippi, aka Stevin John, fka Steven or "Steezy" Grossman (no relation). A line of thought about loving those who are no longer alive leads her to discuss the nature of pet love as something that exists inside of us and how the expression and feeling of that love is, in many ways, projection of something that doesn't go away when someone gone. She somehow relates this both to Travis Barker and Kourtney Kardashian's recent public display of their love of the movie True Romance and the way in which Nabokov's letters to his wife a

Dog trainer Ilana Alderman, one of Annie's closest friends, has a reputation at School For The Dogs for being a kind of Disney Princess: She looks sort of like Snow White, and seems to titter with birds and befriend fish like Cinderella or Ariel. For nearly a decade, Ilana has focused on training (and enriching the lives of) pretty much every animal she's come across. She has taught fish to play basketball, helped ring tail lemurs learn to step onto scales, taught goats to enjoy being milked, built tiny amusement parks for mice, and even trained the squirrels in her yard to ring a doorbell. She also has helped Annie organize her closet, and feels this is a kind of animal training too. Ilana has never owned a dog, but she has helped many dog owners, and is the architect of the School For The Dogs Professional Course and its open source free online text book, Born To Behave. She and Annie discuss her journey into the world of behavior and the latest animal who is benefiting from being her presence: Her son.  Fi

Annie talks about why she is generally against costumes for dogs and suggests some alternatives to dressing up your dog on Halloween. She also discusses some feedback she got about last week’s episode, which featured an interview with the lawyer representing the woman who was mauled by Cesar Millan’s dog. Lastly, she shares two anecdotes: one about how she is using a Buy Nothing group on Facebook to get neighbors to help her train her dog (unbeknownst to them) and the other about how her attempt to use negative reinforcement to get her daughter to brush her teeth ultimately back fired (in a sort of hilarious way). Like this episode? Leave a review on iTunes! Follow us on Instagram: @schoolforthedogs @annie.grossman Mentioned in this episode:Treat N Train Remote treat dispenser http://Schoolforthedogs.com/TTSchool For The Dogs Community App http://Schoolforthedogs.com/communityPet Paint - http://petpaint.comRonda Kaysen’s NY Times article on Buy Nothing https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/22/realestate/buy-nothing

In the summer of 2017, Lidia Matiss, then a high schooler, went to visit her mom at her workplace and, inside the office, was brutally attacked by an off-leash dog. Her mother worked for Cesar's Way, which belongs to Cesar Millan, aka The Dog Whisperer; the dog was Millan's late pit bull, Junior. Annie interviews LA-based lawyer Brian Adesman, who is representing the victim in a suit against Millan, and learns some of the surprising details about the case, including Millan's blaming of the victim and how Queen Latifah's dead dog fits into the picture.  Also, Annie answers a question from a longtime client who wants to know how to go about training a new dog, and her old dog at the same time. She mentions the Revol crate, the Treat and Train, and the Good Dog Training course, all available at StoreForTheDogs.com.  https://storeforthedogs.com/products/the-revol-dog-crate http://schoolforthedogs.com/tt https://storeforthedogs.com/collections/online-courses/products/726834 For a limited time, we're offering a 30-

This is a recording of a live Q and A done on Instagram, @schoolforthedogs. Annie had no childcare while doing this episode and hoped her infant would stay asleep the whole time, but...she didn't!Annie answer's listener's questions about...-An older Cheweenie who has stopped peeing/pooping in the yard ever since a younger, smaller dog came to live with them.-A dog who will only go in the yard when the owner is there with him.-A newly-adopted senior Chihuahua who is goes bonkers when seeing other dogs on the streetand-A Bernedoodle who is jumping on people.Get alerted about the next one or ask a question in advance at http://schoolforthedogs.com/qanda.Mentioned in this episode:Episode 117 | Dog Training Q and A! 2/4/2021: Is it okay if my dog only “goes” once a day? Also: Counter surfing, curbing barking in the dog park, helping a dog feel okay about the car after a car crash, and morehttps://bit.ly/3oZ703xSFTD's Sidewalks Psychos class https://www.schoolforthedogs.com/services/sidewalk-psychos/---Partial Tran

If you want to get the best work out of employees, do you send them on a scavenger hunt each week when it's time for them to get paid, or do you put the money directly into their bank account? When it comes to dog training, it's equally important to think about where you're delivering "payment."  Annie suggests where you might want to put a treat, depending on the circumstances, why this is an important thing to think about, and talks about how she once witnessed a dog training miracle that involved nothing but a paper plate.Are you in NYC? Apply to School Yard, our members-only off leash service, at http://schoolforthedogs.com/application Learn more about all our services at http://schoolforthedogs.com/services Have a dog training question? Annie will try to answer it during next week's Q and A! Ask away at http://anniegrossman.com/ask---Partial Transcript:Annie:I wanted to give a quick update on the friend I spoke to during last week’s episode. Right after we talked, she text messaged me: “Thank you for hav

One of Annie’s best friends from high school got a puppy and called Annie to get some advice on managing a puppy in a household with four kids (and a husband who isn’t totally in favor of keeping the dog…). Annie gives her friend some helpful tips.Links:Work to Eat toyshttps://www.schoolforthedogs.com/worktoeat/How to make a flirt polehttps://storeforthedogs.com/blogs/news/dog-flirt-poles-you-can-diy--Partial Transcript:Annie:What you are about to hear is a conversation I had about a month ago with a friend of mine from high school. She lives in the Midwest, in the suburbs of a big city. She has four little kids. She texted me saying that she had just gotten a puppy, but things were not going so well, and her husband really wanted to get rid of the puppy, and she was feeling rather desperate. So I said, give me a call. Let’s talk this through. Maybe I can give you some ideas, but Hey, would you mind if I recorded our conversation? And perhaps I can share it on the podcast.As regular listeners know, I got a lo

Annie shares two recent anecdotes from her life, both involving humans behaving in extreme ways and young animals she loves (her toddler and her dog Poppy) having meltdowns. These two events made her think about punishment, fear, socialization, behavioral expectations, generalizations, and the way in which people treat animals (dogs or humans) who are emotional, for whatever reason. The episode talks about counter conditioning, using punishment on animals who are experiencing fear, and looks at the weird ways in which different people react to scared dogs: from bellowing at them to getting down on all fours.Enjoying this podcast? Here are things you can do!-Give a 5-star rating and leave a review on iTunes-Follow @schoolforthedogs and @annie.grossman on Instagram-Shop at storeforthedogs.com-Tell your friends about us-Sign up for our newsletter at schoolforthedogs.com/newsletter---Partial Transcript:[music and intro]Annie:I wanted to share two kind of crazy experiences I had recently that relate to behavior an