This Adorable Holiday Event Helps Shelter Dogs Get Adopted

In 2015, the Humane Society of Missouri started a program called Shelter Buddies Reading Program. The idea was simple: help dogs become more adoptable by allowing them to spend more time around people. And by people, it meant young children who would come and sit outside each animal's pen and read to them.

Related: Why You Should Adopt an Adult or Senior Pet 

Reading to the dogs helps to bring comfort to and reduce the anxiety of shelter pets, say program organizers. When a child sits in front of the kennel and reads, explains JoEllyn Klepacki, director of education at the Humane Society of Missouri, "it encourages the dog to come to the kennel front and that's something we want them to do when adopters are walking through. Dogs who are at the kennel front get adopted more quickly than those that are hiding in the back."

Reading to dogs also nurtures empathy in children and can help them improve their reading proficiency. One study showed that children who took part in a reading to the dogs program for at least one year were able to boost their reading skills by as much as two grade levels.

Related: 12 Gifts That Dogs and Cats Will Love

Children who participate are encouraged to bring their favorite books to read. However, the Humane Society of Missouri has a library of more than 100 animal-themed books that children could choose from, too.

Shelter Buddies Reading Program has grown and expanded since its inception. Now shelters and humane societies across the country, including California and Colorado as well as Massachusetts and Maryland, are participating. And earlier this week, many of those participants kicked the reading program up a notch with the "Deck the Howls" event. It occurred on December 12.

While "Deck the Howls" was headquartered, if you will, at the Humane Society of Missouri's St. Louis location, more than two dozen humane societies and animal shelters coast-to-coast participated in this paws-itively adorable holiday event. The event had children in holiday pajamas sitting and reading holiday stories to adoptable animals. The children also decorated dog treats to give out to the pets at the shelter, essentially giving them a bedtime snack while they helped tuck the dogs in with, of course, a bedtime story.

By building nationwide support, kids participating in Deck the Howls collectively helped hundreds—possibly thousands—of shelter animals waiting for their new furever homes this holiday season.

Not only is this holiday event fun for the kids, the Shelter Buddies Reading Program is truly beneficial. According to the Humane Society of Missouri, since the program started in 2015, the average length of stay for a shelter dog has dropped by six days.

The Humane Society of Missouri has trained more than 2,400 young readers to become part of the Shelter Buddies Reading Program, and that number grows each year. In addition, more than 350 shelters across the nation—and the world—have requested information from the Humane Society of Missouri to implement similar programs at their organizations.