Pet Talk: Canine companions boost readers' confidence

By Jacques Von Lunen/Specil to The Oregonian

November 16, 2009

By Jamie Francis/The Oregonian-Olive, a therapy dog, volunteers at the French-American International School as a reading companion. During a recent visit, students Youssef Boshra-Riad, 8 (left), and Spencer Schuh, 8, show the book Spencer wrote to Olive and owner Julie Dubansky.

The little voice barely carries past the brown-haired girl's lips.

"I have a pet. It is a cat." The girl reads the staccato phrases from a thin book in her lap. She doesn't look at her audience; she knows Olive is right next to her, sprawled out on a blanket.

The girl, like the other children waiting their turns, prepared all week for this moment; now she's making sure her reading is spot on. Not that she has to worry about being embarrassed or corrected -- Olive is a retriever-shepherd mix.

Students in this second-grade English class at the French-American International School in the Cedar Hills neighborhood read to the young dog once a week. Teachers and school officials say the new canine visitor will help the children's learning, a safe assumption given the experiences of other Portland schools.

The French-American students' first assignment this year was to produce books about their animals. They wrote stories, drew pictures and sewed pages into bindings to make the small volumes.

That's an involved project for 7- and 8-year-olds. But when their teacher said they'd have a four-legged regular visitor soon, the kids set a deadline.

"It was the kids' idea to read (their own) stories to Olive," says Robin Faltersack, their English teacher. "It motivated them to finish their books." Read full story.