How Stella Learned to Talk: The Groundbreaking Story of the World's First Talking Dog
by Christina Hunger
- New
- Hardcover
- Signed
- Condition
- New/New
- ISBN 10
- 0063046830
- ISBN 13
- 9780063046832
- Seller
-
Des Moines, Iowa, United States
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About This Item
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INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
An incredible, revolutionary true story and surprisingly simple guide to teaching your dog to talk from speech-language pathologist Christina Hunger, who has taught her dog, Stella, to communicate using simple paw-sized buttons associated with different words.
When speech-language pathologist Christina Hunger first came home with her puppy, Stella, it didn't take long for her to start drawing connections between her job and her new pet. During the day, she worked with toddlers with significant delays in language development and used Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) devices to help them communicate. At night, she wondered: If dogs can understand words we say to them, shouldn't they be able to say words to us? Can dogs use AAC to communicate with humans?
Christina decided to put her theory to the test with Stella and started using a paw-sized button programmed with her voice to say the word "outside" when clicked, whenever she took Stella out of the house. A few years later, Stella now has a bank of more than thirty word buttons, and uses them daily either individually or together to create near-complete sentences.
How Stella Learned to Talk is part memoir and part how-to guide. It chronicles the journey Christina and Stella have taken together, from the day they met, to the day Stella "spoke" her first word, and the other breakthroughs they've had since. It also reveals the techniques Christina used to teach Stella, broken down into simple stages and actionable steps any dog owner can use to start communicating with their pets.
Filled with conversations that Stella and Christina have had, as well as the attention to developmental detail that only a speech-language pathologist could know, How Stella Learned to Talk will be the indispensable dog book for the new decade.
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Reviews
How Stella Learned To Talk is a non-fiction book by American speech therapist, Christine Hunger. The author provides a few anecdotes of her work with children, and describes her experience dog-sitting for a friend whose pets had been trained to ring a bell when they needed to go out.
When she and her fiancé, Jake discussed getting a dog, they initially rejected the idea of a puppy, but fell in love with a Catahoula/Blue Heeler puppy, which they named Stella. Christina saw parallels between the language development of toddlers and the behaviour of young dogs, and wondered what dogs might want to say if they, like humans, had access to the tools to express themselves.
Eighteen months, a lot of patience and persistence, and some recordable buttons later, and Stella uses nouns, verbs, names, adjectives, and question words to tell Christina what she wants to do, where she wants to go, when she is thinking about Christina, what they are doing, what she likes, when she is mad, when she is happy, when she needs alone time, when Christina and Jake are being good, to answer questions, to ask questions, to participate in short conversations, and to make her own unique phrases every day.
On the author's website, readers can see video of Stella using her device. The book contains teaching tips for those who want to teach their own dog to speak, as well as a list of resources, recommended reading, comprehensive notes and eight pages of colour plates. This is an utterly fascinating read.
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Details
- Bookseller
- The Anthropologists Closet (US)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 200104
- Title
- How Stella Learned to Talk: The Groundbreaking Story of the World's First Talking Dog
- Author
- Christina Hunger
- Format/Binding
- Hardcover
- Book Condition
- New New
- Jacket Condition
- New
- Quantity Available
- 1
- ISBN 10
- 0063046830
- ISBN 13
- 9780063046832
- Publisher
- William Morrow
- Date Published
- 2021
- Keywords
- Signed, Collectible, Bestseller, Pets, Dogs, Dog training,
Terms of Sale
The Anthropologists Closet
About the Seller
The Anthropologists Closet
About The Anthropologists Closet
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