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A review by sauvageloup
How Stella Learned to Talk by Christina Hunger
informative
inspiring
reflective
relaxing
medium-paced
4.0
A fascinating insight into teaching a dog to communicate with language!
Pros:
- the anecdotes at the start involving children using AAC were something I hadn't anticipated but found fascinating.
- Hunger writes well, in an informative, light-hearted and direct manner. The book progresses well, encompassing Stella's growth and showing how Hunger was learning alongside her. She's definitely struck on something original here and her results are amazing.
- Hunger's passion for her work, for her dog, and for life in general is obvious and comes through completely in her work.
- I liked the tips about teaching your own dog, which were generally helpful.
- Hunger had a very positive attitude towards believing in all children's' potential and in making language accessible. She has strong views about not teaching animals (or children) to just do as they're told, but to encourage them to speak so that they can express their wants and needs and have them met. She makes it very clear how cruel it would be to then take that language device away from them, which I found very encouraging and agreed with.
Cons:
- I wish there had been more specific anecdotes in relation to both children and dogs using AAC, rather than general theory/discussion. The parts I most enjoyed were real life examples and stories from Christina's experience.
- I did find some parts confusing in relation to teaching your own dog, and Hunger responded to Stella's words in a way I wouldn't have thought of, and also understood Stella's words when to me they looked random. This isn't necessarily a con, but I did feel that the book could have covered *more*. Unlike some nonfiction books, it didn't feel particularly information dense, like the Tristran Gooley, where I felt like taking notes when I was reading it because of all the good info. I felt like it was obvious how huge Hunger's knowledge base was and the wealth of experience she was drawing from, but I didn't feel like she shared a great deal of it, just some very specific, small nuggets and anecdotes.
- I did feel there was some... unacknowledged privilege in there. They're able to move towards having more time off to spend outside and with Stella. A lot of people would struggle hugely to commit the time it takes to do that and that's not really mentioned. She stays very nonpolitical, never talking about how all children should have free access to AAC, where I'm sure in the US they don't, or how people with 2 or more jobs might not be able to commit this time to their pet. She also ends up going with getting a breeder puppy rather than a shelter dog, even though the shelter dog was offered to them after the miscommunication was brought up.
Overall, I very much enjoyed this and sped through it in an afternoon. I was fascinated to read on and my main criticism is that it wasn't long enough and I wanted more!
Pros:
- the anecdotes at the start involving children using AAC were something I hadn't anticipated but found fascinating.
- Hunger writes well, in an informative, light-hearted and direct manner. The book progresses well, encompassing Stella's growth and showing how Hunger was learning alongside her. She's definitely struck on something original here and her results are amazing.
- Hunger's passion for her work, for her dog, and for life in general is obvious and comes through completely in her work.
- I liked the tips about teaching your own dog, which were generally helpful.
- Hunger had a very positive attitude towards believing in all children's' potential and in making language accessible. She has strong views about not teaching animals (or children) to just do as they're told, but to encourage them to speak so that they can express their wants and needs and have them met. She makes it very clear how cruel it would be to then take that language device away from them, which I found very encouraging and agreed with.
Cons:
- I wish there had been more specific anecdotes in relation to both children and dogs using AAC, rather than general theory/discussion. The parts I most enjoyed were real life examples and stories from Christina's experience.
- I did find some parts confusing in relation to teaching your own dog, and Hunger responded to Stella's words in a way I wouldn't have thought of, and also understood Stella's words when to me they looked random. This isn't necessarily a con, but I did feel that the book could have covered *more*. Unlike some nonfiction books, it didn't feel particularly information dense, like the Tristran Gooley, where I felt like taking notes when I was reading it because of all the good info. I felt like it was obvious how huge Hunger's knowledge base was and the wealth of experience she was drawing from, but I didn't feel like she shared a great deal of it, just some very specific, small nuggets and anecdotes.
- I did feel there was some... unacknowledged privilege in there. They're able to move towards having more time off to spend outside and with Stella. A lot of people would struggle hugely to commit the time it takes to do that and that's not really mentioned. She stays very nonpolitical, never talking about how all children should have free access to AAC, where I'm sure in the US they don't, or how people with 2 or more jobs might not be able to commit this time to their pet. She also ends up going with getting a breeder puppy rather than a shelter dog, even though the shelter dog was offered to them after the miscommunication was brought up.
Overall, I very much enjoyed this and sped through it in an afternoon. I was fascinated to read on and my main criticism is that it wasn't long enough and I wanted more!