We got lucky with Loki. His demeanor with kids has always been great, but now that we have two of our own, he’s had to learn how to be nagged and pulled and loved even more than before. But in addition to Loki’s usually-calm disposition, we’ve tried hard as parents to teach our kids to know how to get along with our animals and respect their boundaries. After all, the furry ones were here first! Once Loki and our cats saw that the kids were (usually) gentle, and provided even more opportunities for extra food and ear scratches, they started warming up pretty quickly. Even to the point of tolerating a little bit of dress-up time.

If your dog isn’t quite as forgiving, or just needs some training pointers, we definitely recommend checking out these great resources:

• Teaching Your Dog How to Behave Around Children – ASPCA
• Help Dogs and Kids be Comfortable Together – ClickerTraining.com

And if you’re looking for dog breeds that are typically good with kids, here are a couple more:

• The 10 Best Dogs for Kids and Families – PetMD.com
• Best Dogs for Kids – FamilyCircle.com