Puppies, kittens and animals new to your home - when is the right time to introduce buttons?
This post is Lizzy’s reflections on teaching a very young puppy to use communication buttons, as well as having talked to and helped dozens of teachers with new learners in their homes in their first weeks and months of button teaching.
It’s not intended as universal best practice, but it is informed by experience and we hope will be helpful to some new teachers deciding how to start introducing button teaching.
Safety first
If your learner is at any risk of chewing, trying to break up or swallow the buttons/tiles, take them up or gate them off whenever your learner is unsupervised. We so often have a moment with a new animal in our household where we think “oh they’re doing so much better with their impulse control/chewing/scratching etc, I can trust them now” and live to regret it - don’t make that mistake with small plastic items that contain multiple batteries!! Lumps of rubber or foam are also very bad news if swallowed, so be cautious.
Lizzy’s Background
Bunny and I began with 4 buttons when she was a 3 month-old puppy, and a year later she has over 70 buttons across two boards. It's a process I'm so pleased I began, but it was incredibly hard in the first few months, and because it was a new skill for me to learn, it took a lot of time and energy to introduce buttons alongside settling her into her new home. Starting early worked for us partly because of our setup – including me working from home in a job that allowed me to still respond to button presses and model throughout the day. Bunny was not a chewer, and generally happy to only play with things marked out as her toys, which meant she could have access to buttons a lot very early on.
There are dogs and cats that began learning buttons at 10 years-old or more and are very successful communicators, so don’t feel that it’s now or never if the time you have available or your priorities mean it’s a challenge to have buttons in the early days.
“I didn’t introduce the word “ball” until we’d labelled playing with a ball so she also developed the behaviour of bringing me a ball - that also meant that I understood what her non-button communication method was, so I could label it reliably.”
Priorities
Don’t let button training interfere with basic training and settling your new charge into your home. Buttons can absolutely wait if it's too much to handle at first or you have behavioural issues that need addressing and are taking a lot of time and energy. It's an exciting concept to teach your pet to talk, and while I absolutely encourage everyone to bring buttons into their young/new learner's worlds, toilet training, manners, learning basic commands etc need to come first and it's OK if that means you don't feel you always are able to give 100% to the buttons, or wait a little while to add them.
When to introduce buttons
When welcoming a new animal into their home there are people who have used buttons from day 1, I certainly don’t want to discourage anyone from doing that, but I would suggest taking a little while to get to know your new charge before introducing buttons. The first couple of weeks are so intense (not to mention sleep deprived if you’re house training), and you have so much to think about. Your number one priority is learning about each other and bonding, and I feel that initial time with your learner can give you a much better idea as to appropriate first words. You’ll also understand your learner’s body language and moods a little by then, which will help you use the buttons constructively. Also keep in mind that with a rescue with an unknown background, they may need time to fully decompress from the shelter experience and whatever else they’ve been through. Most rescues say to give at least three months for a rescue animal’s natural personality to start coming through.
When I was working with my puppy, I didn’t want my puppy to only be able to use a button to ask for something she would ordinarily learn to use body language to communicate about, so for example, I didn’t introduce the word “ball” until we’d labelled playing with a ball so she also developed the behaviour of bringing me a ball - that also meant that I understood what her non-button communication method was, so I could label it reliably.
When thinking about the right time to add buttons, consider your setup. Your first teaching job is showing your learner what buttons do - by using them lots where they can see, and also that buttons are for them to use as and when they want - by making them available and praising and responding positively when they press buttons, even accidentally. You won’t achieve that if your buttons are mostly unavailable because they’re outside the space (such as a playpen) your learner spends the majority of their time, and you’ll create frustration if your learner can’t press the buttons when they want to. Consider your availability too - ideally I’d recommend introducing buttons when you’re able to respond to presses most of the time.
If you have your first buttons and have days where you don’t model them much or at all that’s probably not going to cause setbacks, but you being stressed around the buttons, or frustrated by their lack of use will.Your learner will see them as a negative thing in their world and can become resentful or avoidant of the buttons. You absolutely must let your learner go at their own pace. Add them when you’ve learned enough about modelling and how to teach that you’ll approach them in the right way (finding the forum is a great start!)
If your learner is incredibly destructive, then you might want to wait until you have some established ways to manage that behaviour. As I mentioned up top, never leave your learner unattended with their buttons until you’re sure they’ll be safe. If you need advice, please reach out to the community.
You want to feel confident you can manage any negative reactions they might feel towards these strange noisy buttons - if your learner is still getting to know you it will take time for them to trust you and feel settled in their home, so don’t introduce something that is going to be an additional source of anxiety for an already anxious animal. If your learner is very fearful and reactive to noise, wait until you’re confident you know them well enough to safely interpret their behaviour and thresholds, and have successful techniques in place you can use to manage their reactivity.
How to set up
I would definitely recommend using FluentPet buttons with a small learner as they’re so much easier to press. At 2kg a 3 month old puppy had no chance of activating buttons the size of the Learning Resource buttons, and we had a couple of wasted weeks trying to use them without success. That goes double for kittens and cats, who tend to have more trouble learning to use their body weight to press down with their paw.
I’ve seen enough learners have problems consolidating buttons set up next to objects into a central board to be confident recommending that you start with your words in a central location. Moving buttons is a big change, and the idea of pressing a button is not a natural one so we need to tread carefully when we disrupt something we’ve only just begun teaching (imagine the keys on your keyboard being rearranged a month into you learning to touch type!). Not all learners struggle to adapt to changes, but don’t risk confusion, setbacks or spending weeks bringing your buttons slowly together in one location.
Put one button per tile, or two buttons on opposite sides. You may well be able to have more buttons per tile later on, but your learner is not going to be precise in using their paw at this stage in their life while they’re growing and building body awareness (or because they’re probably untrained if they’re an adult rescue).
Baby Bunny looking out the window
“At 2kg a 3 month old puppy had no chance of activating buttons the size of the Learning Resource buttons, and we had a couple of wasted weeks trying to use them without success. That goes double for kittens and cats, who tend to have more trouble learning to use their body weight to press down with their paw.”
Work on verbal modelling from day 1
Being more consistent with the language you use around your learner (like picking one word for food instead of saying dinner, breakfast, hungry, kibble etc) is a great start and will prime your learner for using those concepts on buttons down the line. Considering your word choice for everyday things and talking to your new charge lots in simple language will really set you up for success. That’s verbal modelling in a nutshell.
Consistent use of language will help your communication even if you never add a button. However, it will set you up for success and less changes down the line when you do add buttons. After consciously noticing the words you’re using and trying to be consistent with one term for your concept, you might decide a word you thought you would use might not be what you tend to say in practice - that’s another reason I don’t think there’s any harm in giving a few days/weeks before putting buttons down, as it gives time for you to start building your ‘shared dictionary’.
Button teaching
I’m not setting out to talk about teaching in any detail, as there’s specific resources for that. I do want to pick up a couple of key points for young or new learners in your household though.
Specifically on using the buttons with toilet training, Bunny and I had absolutely no traction with the "outside" button for months, while other learners take to it really quickly and use it like a 'potty bell' straight away. I had to adjust my expectations and recognise that not every learner takes to every button straight away - I really hoped to use "outside" for toilet training but it just wasn't a word she wanted to use early on. Priority number 1 is working out what their I’m-about-to-pee signals are and if you can remember to press a button as you run out the door with them then that;s all the modelling you need to do - with a tiny dog with a tiny bladder and no interest in giving me a signal I sure couldn’t manage that consistently for a while, but she uses that button all the time now! If your “outside” or “potty” button doesn’t click that’s fine, it doesn’t mean your learner isn’t going to get the hang of using their buttons. This one just might take a while. Never withhold anything that meets a basic need waiting for a button press - it will cause frustration, and in the case of toilet training it will lead to accidents and stress for you both.
Your learner is in a brand new home getting used to lots of new things, and it’s all about making the board a place where fun things happen right now. With “play” for example… every time they pick up a toy don’t stop a bouncy puppy or kitten trying to play and bond with you by making them go over to the board hoping they will press “play” - they’re already telling you what they want and it’s probably going to get annoying for both of you (and they’ll probably get bitey!). Instead go play near the buttons, keep pressing the “play” button and saying the word lots during your play session, and initiate play sessions using the buttons yourself as much as you can.
Choose first words your learner knows and is excited by - your starter words show your learner buttons are useful, which is going to be a whole lot easier if they understand the meaning of the word they hear when you/they press the button! Don’t forget how unnatural communicating using buttons is to an animal. Making the process even more complicated by expecting them to learn what each word means alongside how the buttons work is an awful lot for a young and/or very busy. Once your learner understands what the buttons are and how they work then you can begin to use the buttons to teach them brand new concepts if you want.
Restricting access
Don’t remove the tiles or buttons because of bad behaviour or as a punishment, or because you’re tired of hearing button presses. See each press as an opportunity to teach, and the more your learner realises the buttons are useful and valuable the more likely they are to not treat them as toys.
Your learner is treating your buttons just like any other things in their new world - they are exploring and testing boundaries and you have to try to keep steady and persist. We wouldn’t take all our chairs away just because our puppy is chewing a chair leg, or say, “Oh well I guess that rug is now a toilet because the kitten keeps peeing there,” you persevere.
Takeaway points
No matter how long your learner has lived with you, the best approach is to model as much as you can but not put any pressure or expectation on you or your learner. Don’t put pressure on yourself either! If they are too busy learning what's going on in their new home or you're too tired from those 4am toilet trips then that's completely understandable and nothing to worry about - you'll get there at your own pace.
Things to bare in mind:
Don’t leave your learner unsupervised with buttons or tiles until you’re confident it’s safe
If you can’t manage buttons right now that’s absolutely fine.
Put socialisation and basic training first - you have years to work on button teaching but responsiveness, house training and safety commands are essential
Your learner doesn’t know the meaning of a lot of words and it will take time for them to learn.
Modelling is the most important thing you can do, model only verbally for a while and you’re still setting yourself up for success.
NEVER EVER withhold or delay anything that meets a basic need (like going potty/toilet, food or water)
When you do begin, model and move on to your activity, don’t cause frustration or make your learner see buttons as a barrier to fun
