How to Get a Toddler to Learn Not to Kick or Hit the Dogs

I agree about keeping them separated. If your child wants to play with the dog so badly, he'll have to learn appropriate behavior. At 2, they are getting pretty sharp with what they can understand. Doggy playtime will have to be supervised! Very serious discipline should be used when the child aggravates the dog. Some dogs will only take so much and the dog is, afterall, another member of the family. Good luck.

At 23 months, the capacity for reasoning is not wonderful, but you should start now telling your toddler that they cannot play with the dog that way because it will hurt the dog. Compare it to when your son fell down at some point and cried. Try to think of a situation that is recent that he might have some memory of...this has to be repeated until he really understands why he can't do this. In the meantime, your son should not be left alone with your dog(s). You should allow them to be together when you are there and you should be paying strict attention to their interactions. If he does something that is inappropriate (ideally, you would catch this before it happens), your son needs to be punished. It is very important to teach a child appropriate behavior around animals. You should teach him that aside from not hurting an animal, he should also not approach them when they are sleeping, eating, or with puppies or kittens. You should also teach him that he should not pet another animal he does not know unless he has asked permission. I fear that if you don't correct your son's behavior at this point, an animal will get hurt, and your son may, too. It is often the animal that pays for the child's mistake. Thank you for being proactive about this, so hopefully that whole nasty circle can be avoided.

Many of us just responded here to another mother who didn't see her daughter about to tackle their sleeping dog, and the dog promptly bit the little girl in the face. The bottom line is that until you are able to make sure your son doesn't hurt the dog (like he is now doing), you need to keep them at a distance from each other.

When a dog bites because it is being hurt, everyone then wants to blame the dog. Not only is this not fair to the dog, but your son could truly be hurt when the dog has had enough. Children have been mauled and killed by dogs and I daresay many of them were abusing the dogs in some way.

Your son, at almost 2, is old enough to learn what you are trying to teach him (unless there is a developmental delay). It is a matter of you being consistent in your "punishment" of his misbehavior. If he kicks or hits the dog, he needs to be removed from where the dog is and not allowed near him--and not just for 5 or 10 minutes and then allowed to do it again. By not being consistent with whatever discipline you are using to deal with this, you are probably reinforcing this bad behavior. Please protect both your son and your dog and put a stop to this before it goes too far.

if you can't train 'em, restrain 'em.
goes for babies just as it does for dogs.
when you can totally supervise your toddler, by all means let him interact with the dogs. but when you can't, keep them apart until your son is old enough to understand and be taught how to treat animals appropriately.
for both their sakes.
khairete
S.

Keep them separated until your baby gets a little older and can understand his actions are unacceptable. Use child guard gates.

Only let them play together when you can closely supervise them. When the play gets rough, playtime is over. Neither should be allowed to hurt the other. A live animal is not a stuffed toy. It takes awhile for toddlers to learn to be gentle and kind.

My daughter (16 months) used to always hit our cats. For several months we told her "no" and told her to "be nice". While saying "be nice" we took her hand and gently petted our cat. We would pet the cat nicely and say "nice" as well. It took some time but now when she goes near the cat or is getting rough we say "be nice" and she strokes the cat nicely. This has also worked for other items that she is getting to rough with (like my freshly planted flowers) and often we say it before she gets to rough with an item. She is quickly learning how to "be nice" now! The key is to be consistent with your language and show your son how to do it every time until he understands what to do. Good luck!

Isolate him and don't let him play with them if he can't play nice. Eventually he will learn.

I wouldn't say that complete separation is a good idea. The dog needs to acclimate to a toddler and your son needs to learn appropriate play with the dogs. It just means you have to supervise carefully whenever they are together. My son is 1 and we are consistently working with him and our 2 great danes. We model appropriate petting for him, praise him when he pets the dogs nicely and then when he does hit or climb on them, we tell him no and remove him from the room. This has been going on for 8 months, ever since my son could move and get to the dogs. It's just a matter of consistency over a long period of time. Sometimes he's really good with the dogs and other times, it's a battle because he does want to play with the dogs but we move him away because he is playing inappropriately. Good luck with this. It is very important because you don't want to put your dog into a situation where he reacts and harms your son.
E.