Puppy Desensitizers
Volunteer Puppy Desensitizers help socialize puppies between 3 and 6 weeks of age, introducing them to a variety of people to support their early development. Ideally, volunteers have different appearances, ages, and voices so puppies experience a wide range of human interactions during these critical early weeks.
Visits occur once a week for 10–30 minutes. Children are welcome, but must be at least 10 years old and accompanied by a parent, and must be supervised at all times. These guided visits play an important role in helping puppies grow into confident, well-adjusted dogs.
Early Puppy Trainers
Volunteer Early Puppy Trainers work with puppies between 5 and 9 weeks old, visiting 1–3 times per week to introduce early cues and home behaviors. Each session will be 1-2 hours. Volunteers ideally have prior experience with Helping Paws training methods so they are familiar with how we teach cues and skills.
Early cues include sit, drop, stay, and wait, while early skills focus on proper kennel introduction and appropriate behavior around people. These sessions lay the foundation for the puppies’ future success as confident, well-trained assistance dogs.
Please note - Volunteers are required to wear clean clothes that have not touched other animals, bring clean socks to change into, leave their shoes outside the home at the door, and wash their hands thoroughly before handling any puppies.
