Animal-Assisted Intervention (Elisabethheim Havetoft)

Animal-Assisted Intervention at Elisabethheim Havetoft sustainably promotes the development of children and adolescents with behavioral issues and developmental disorders in Schleswig-Holstein. Through targeted individual and small group sessions, dogs, horses, and other animals are employed as co-therapists. The focus is on strengthening cognitive, social, motor, and practical life skills: participants take responsibility for an animal, experience emotional closeness, and practice social interaction. Within a protected environment, rules are taught, motor skills are practiced, and self-esteem is enhanced through successful interactions. Specialist Karolin Krause, along with the animal team Buddy, Loki, and the Haflinger mare Vera, expertly and empathetically guide the measures to achieve individual developmental goals.

As a grant program of the Elisabethheim Havetoft Foundation, the funding is aimed at children and adolescents privately accommodated at Elisabethheim. Applications can be submitted at any time to respond flexibly to funding needs. Animal-assisted pedagogy complements existing socio-educational and therapeutic support and opens new avenues for young people who require assistance in acquiring everyday competencies and expanding social skills. Through continuous collaboration between humans and animals, a sense of responsibility, environmental awareness, and confidence in one’s own abilities develop. Interested institutions and parents directly experience how impulses from animal-assisted intervention contribute to sustainable life management and pave the way to a self-determined life.