How Stella Learned to Talk audiobook

5★“Back at work, I was reviewing a toddler language assessment I completed when something struck me.‘If Stella is already gesturing at eight weeks old, what other communication skills does she display that overlap with those of toddlers?’”The author is a speech therapist who specialises in AAC, augmentative and alternative communication. She works with toddlers and small children who aren’t speaking, some of whom have already had countless therapists who have had little success. The point of AAC is to find ways for people to communicate, perhaps by using a device with pictures to point to or even a speech program like English theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking used with a computer.When Christina and Jake got a puppy, she noticed very quickly how the puppy did what children do. Stella had wandered around the place, sniffing all the toys, interested in everything.“Stella approached her dishes and pawed her water bowl. ‘Oh, you need water? Let’s get more water, Stella’. In only two days of living here, Stella learned what each dish was for. She even gestured by pawing her dish to let me know that she needed more water.”This is an eight-week old puppy, remember, not an experienced older dog, so it’s natural that Christina might start making comparisons with her very young clients. She began making lists of the prelinguistic skills that she assessed in the kids and the milestones that Stella had already reached. Stella cries to get attention, stands by her food bowl when she sees Jake or Christina go to the shelf where here food is, and interacts with adults when she drops the ball at their feet. There are milestones parents look for in their kids - first smile, first word, first step. We help kids reach these by smiling, repeating simple words over and over, helping kids when they indicate what they want. When a tiny tot says “Up”, they reach up to be carried. They’ve learned to add the word to the gesture.Anyone who has had a dog knows how expressive they can be. Dogs will bring you their leash, push their empty food bowl around, paw at your leg if you’re on the phone (ignoring them) – the list is endless. We had working dogs, so we knew how smart they are at interpreting our verbal commands and gestures even when they were a long way across a paddock and a mob of sheep. They are magic!But that’s as far as it goes. That’s dogs understanding our words and actions while they have only the most rudimentary gestures to indicate what they want. Christina decides to embark on Speech Therapy for Dogs.She started simply, by getting a few buttons that when pressed would say a pre-recorded word. “Outside”, “play”, “water” - that sort of thing. As time went on, she added words. The way Stella learned to use them was remarkable and sometimes hilarious! She began to put a few together or use them in ways to make comments, rather than just tap out “Water”.There’s a funny episode where after they’d changed the clocks back, they wanted to move Stella’s dinner to an hour later to keep her in synch with their work schedules next week. Stella kept saying (tapping the button) ‘Eat’.“I gave Stella a couple of treats to tide her over but kept saying, ‘No eat now, eat later’.Fifteen minutes passed.‘Help eat’ Stella said then barked.‘I know Stella, good waiting. Eat later’Stella sighed. She stood still for about ten seconds.‘Love you, no’ she said. Stella walked away into the bedroom.”Christina and Jake were astounded! They had added a “no” button earlier. The “love you” button came later, and they used the phrase a lot when they were cuddling and tummy tickling. They had added the “help” button for when Stella had a ball stuck under the couch or something like that. They wanted to make it possible for Stella to express herself, and by golly she did!Another time, when they had late visitors who were taking a long time to leave at the end of the evening and were standing around the door, as you do, having another conversation, Stella got up, walked over to her button board, and said “Bye”, then walked back to her bed and curled up. Everyone cracked up . . . and left!This all took place over Stella’s first months with Christina. Her story has now been featured in magazines and on TV and Christina’s website Hunger for Words, if you would like to know more. She has included tips at the end of each chapter as well as footnotes and references. It’s an enjoyable read, especially for anyone who lives with dogs.From personal experience with dogs, conversation is all very well, but when someone is on a motorbike in a paddock shouting “Oh, for crying out loud what do you think you’re doing? Get back here!” what the dog hears is BACK, which is generally the command to run further around the other side of a mob of sheep. Stick to the simple words, the commands they know. For us, either COME BEHIND or ALL ABOARD. Poor old Bluey is going to do what he thinks he’s been told. [The same is true of computers - they do what you tell them, not what you want. Dogs are more intuitive, at least!]And when we look at our dogs as they paw at the door and tilt their heads at us, and maybe make a small woof, we don’t know if they want to go chase something outside, or find a toy they left outside, or go for a piddle, but with the right training and the right buttons, they can tell us a lot.I look forward to the continuing adventures of Stella and the Hunger for Words program. Thanks to Allen and Unwin for the beautiful preview copy for review from which I’ve quoted, so it’s possible some quotes may have changed.

Hunger is a speech therapist who specializes in AAC, augmentative and alternative communication. For most of her career so far, she has worked with toddlers. She wondered if she should try to train her puppy to communicate by pressing buttons that generate audio clips of single words or two-word phrases. Did it work? Beyond her wildest dreams.The most interesting (to me) communications that the dog has come up with so far:• "Beach beach beach beach beach": I thought the whole experiment would go like this, frankly. But the author says that Stella quickly learned that beach time happened only in the afternoons and evenings. So the phase of requesting "beach" in the middle of the night was brief.• "Jake no bed": Stella said this when Hunger's partner was out of town, just before Stella curled up to sleep on his side of the bed. I think it's fascinating that Stella found this use for the word no.• "Christina bye": This is what Stella told the dogsitter right after the author left and before Stella went to look out the window. I did not expect a dog to be able to formulate a thought about a past event in this way.• "Christina later": Stella said this when the author tried to pet her at the same time that visitors were also petting her. I did not expect a dog to be able to formulate a thought about a future event in this way.• "Love you, no": Part of an extended argument Stella had with the author shortly after the clocks turned back for Daylight Savings. Stella couldn't understand why she was being fed an hour later.• "Eat no": Stella expressing her frustration at being fed later in the evening than usual.• "Mad": What Stella said after she accidentally erased the message on her favorite button, "beach."• "Help": Stella once said this in the middle of the night. The author got up to see what was wrong and found her chasing a cricket around the living room.There are also many three- and four-word messages, and some that are longer than that. I just can't recall them because of my puny human brain.Hunger's background in speech therapy definitely affected how she ran the experiment and what her goals were. She focused on Stella being able to express her thoughts and especially her desires and emotions. In contrast, researchers like Irene Pepperberg have focused on animals' intellectual capacities. Pepperberg's work with African grey parrots indicates that these birds can categorize and classify and that they understand the concept of zero. Along the way, Pepperberg discovered that the parrots could communicate emotional responses too, but that was an interesting side development rather than the focus of the research.Minus one star for being a bit repetitive and padded. I skimmed passages that didn't directly relate to Stella.

Read if you: Have seen those TikTok videos of dogs using communicaton buttons and want to learn more!Some of my favorite TikTokkers are dogs/dog owners communicating through speech buttons. (And even a few cats!) When this book became available, I immediately requested it, as I was curious about the creator of these communication devices. I found a great mix of memoir plus valuable tips/encouragement for owners who want to try this with their dogs. Librarians/booksellers: If dog memoirs/how to books about dogs are popular, definitely purchase.Many thanks to William Morrow/Custom House and NetGalley for a digital review copy in exchange for an honest review.

YES - read it. It will change your view of the world you live in!WOW - just wow!! Not very often nowadays do we get to have our view of the world we live in change and a change promoted from a positive message - lots of negative or doom & gloom but nothing that will make you feel as positive as this book.While the description from the publisher is accurate, don't let the term "guide" fool you. It's way more then a guide to how to train your dog ( or potentially lots of animals) to "talk". It is a guide that is really well laid out with info and tips but the evidence based knowledge (background), anecdotal and behavior descriptions are what's worth the read.It's learning about the INCREDIBLE work the author does providing her human clients a way they can communicate and thus interact with their world. Honestly, I'd take a book on that alone!!It's learning about how the little developmental markers (but added together make for big steps) children and Stella go through in order to develop speech. I remember my college child development teacher explaining that at a point in development your child & your dog both stare at your finger when you point, but at some moment in time your child with look to where you are pointing. So the similarities are very striking when delineated out over the period of time that Stella learns to communicate.To read about Stella's development with her speech is honestly a wee bit unsettling. To me, it clearly shows an intelligence that humans have actively tried to discredit. Stella lets her people know what she wants and how she feels. As a global society, how can we continue to ignore animal's abilities and thus their rights when we now have the ability to communicate meaningfully with them?I received an ARC from Netgalley and William Morrow to prepare for my honest review.

When I first saw videos appearing online of people teaching their dogs to talk by using buttons, I was immediately fascinated and wanted to try it myself. Since then, I've often gone back and forth between wanting to try and feeling like it'd be too hard. After reading this book, I got some of that motivation back again and want to at least try a few words. I have so much respect for how the author did this and got through the hard moments of uncertainty. I listened to the audiobook (highly recommended, by the way) while walking my dog and it inspired me to communicate with her more, even if I'm not using buttons (yet). It's so important to talk to your dog!Definitely recommended for all dog lovers!

This is such a great, inspiring read! I can’t wait to get my buttons to help my dog “talk”Overall this “memoir” is captivating and will warm the best of any animal lover.My only complaint is how often she talked about her giving up social media, tv, minimalism. Hey, I’m all for those things, but they didn’t belong in the book and she mentioned it so frequently I started to wonder if she was wanting a cookie for her efforts. Highly recommend for all dog lovers!

I LOVED this book! Part memoir, part how to, part fantastic story of possibilities, part heart warming human & dog story, part philosophical question raiser, part explication of how science is done, part explanation of the science and art of speech-language pathology, and part AAC (Augmentative and Alternative Communication) cheerleading! But, it is 100% a fantastic story and a great read!Read this if you want an, oh so small, glimpse into the inner life of dogs (yes, they are more than just children's playthings or unconditional love machines!) Read this if you want to think about how communication develops and changes and, in humans, mostly ends with words. A HUGE thank you to the author for sharing the journey!

If someone had just told me about this book, I probably would have been skeptical. Sure, dogs can understand words, but learning to speak? Not only did I LOVE this book, I am totally taken with the idea of teaching our dogs to communicate with words! The author is an incredible voice for the field of speech pathology. Her understanding of language acquisition and her observational skills give her an innovative perspective into the world of dog training. I will definitely be giving this book as a gift to my dog training friends!

I'm a huge fan of animal cognition studies so I got this book immediately after I saw it in the bookstore. The book is written by a speech pathologist who works with children with language problems. She seems like she is excellent at her job as she is very caring and patient with the frustrations of her charges. Her caring nature and genuine academic interest in using boards and symbols to learn communication inspired her to try it on her new dog, Stella. Just an aside, yes, I don't agree with her getting the puppy from Craigslist, though for the study raising a dog from puppyhood ultimately made sense. On the other hand, I really think that rescue groups absolutely need to be a LITTLE more reasonable when it comes to adopting out dogs. Clearly, Hunger is a very caring dog mom and the rescue made a mistake in their reluctance to adopt to her. Now onto the book contents: Well, I think it was pretty amazing reading about how Hunger trained Stella to communicate. The advice she gives for how she taught her to speak made sense and relied on the dog's autonomy and desires. I really liked how she encouraged Stella to articulate her needs and desires and not simply as a vehicle for forcing her obedience. She started with simple needs and stretched the possibilities by teaching her to talk in short "sentences" and to emote. You really find yourself loving Stella, loving Hunger and her husband for their devotion to her, and walking through their journey. I really do think it's brilliant, underappreciated work and I just adored this book. I found it fascinating. I even think the book could have been longer. The author offered very little in the way of prior studies other than mentioning Chaser the Border Collie. It's rather surprising that she didn't include studies on Chantek the orangutan or other great apes with whom they've using similar devices. While her studies are novel for dogs, they have already been attempted in other non-domesticated animals. If you're a dog lover and if you love reading about animal intelligence, definitely grab this one.