I really shouldn't have been surprised, she learns best from observation. The majority of our ball-play is with our dog, so she only knows that when the ball is thrown that she is supposed to bring it back. At first I was pretty upset. I felt like a bad parent for not spending more time teaching her how to roll the ball back and forth. After all, every child development book/article/website I read says that she should have been able to roll a ball back and forth between us for quite some time.
I talked to some other parents who were kind enough to admit that their kid also played fetch with them at one time. We bought her some new type of balls, some smaller, some bigger, some rubber, and some plastic. We practiced and played but she just wanted to run after it and hand it back to us. It wasn't until about a week or so ago that she got the hang of it... kind of...
She skipped right over rolling and went straight to throwing... at your face. Unfortunately, she gets about a foot and a half away from you before tossing it. Fortunately, she doesn't put full force into it... yet. She still loves to run after a ball with the dog, but I guess it's not the same as being raised by wolves.
"Indie Song of the Entry"
