Teaching your children to care for pet

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Teaching Your Children To Care For Pets

Kids love pets, and eventually, they'd have to take up some of the pet care responsibilities for their pet animals. After you may have gifted your kid with a pet dog as an expression of love, then comes the task of passing the responsibility of taking care of this dog to them. Teaching kids to show care for pets is a great way to teach them responsibility and human values like empathy towards others. Children with pet responsibilities learn the importance of these responsibilities and the consequences when they shun them. 

Assign responsibilities that match their wit and ability

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How much a kid should be involved in pet care and responsibility is dependent on their age. Specific care responsibilities like bathing your pet may be beyond a toddler's ability. Other grown kids may still need supervision to bathe their pets. You need to start slowly and introduce the child to responsibilities progressively. This has proven to be one of the best ways to teach children to care for pets.

Teach kids to feed pets with healthy treats

Teach children the importance of feeding to the health of their pets. Like birds, dogs, and cats, most pets have very delicate digestive systems and may be affected by many diseases if not fed right. Children need to know that healthy treats like hemp dog biscuits have better health benefits for their pets than pieces of table scraps or other unhealthy options. Generally, it would be best to teach kids which things the pets can eat and what they can't eat. Different foods may be toxic to different pets. For example, avocados have proven to be a problem for birds, dogs can't eat chocolate, and bones are unhealthy for cats. 

Teach your kids to reward pets with healthy treats 

Rewarding good behavior is one of the many ways kids can learn acceptable actions. As a parent, you need to teach your kids to reward pets when they are of good behavior. You can award children too when they take good care of pets. This way, they can efficiently perform good habits to merit great rewards for themselves. Dogs, in particular, absolutely love to be rewarded or praised when they do good. 

Create charts for things they need to do

Creating charts is a more organized way of teaching your kids what responsibilities they need to give their pets maximum care. The charts can involve feeding, watering, or even playing times. Also, they should not include tasks the children can't perform. Instead, do well to supervise your child while they go about their responsibilities until they have a grip on their duties. Doing this improves kids' organizational habits and limits the shirking of responsibilities. 

Supervise your kids 

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Pets can instinctively get aggressive and harm your child accidentally. So it is essential to practice animal  and child safety tips. For example, always supervise your child or keep your eyes on them at all times to prevent any dangerous attacks. Also, children can get extra curious with delicate pets like birds and mistakenly harm them.