How To Teach A Dog Obedience

I'm going to give you some tips on how to teach your dog obedience. What's important in this is to understand that there is no wrong way to do it. There is no magic method, there is no magic answer; what you have to do is find out what works for you and your dog.

Some dogs work very well for food, so they will work for treats, some won't. People tend to be used to the idea that if they go to a training class, and a number of trainers, that treats are the answer. What you have to be careful of with this is that you don't end up in a situation where the dog hears a command, looks at your hands of pockets to see if you've got anything, sees that you haven't and leaves, and that type of behavior can be a common consequence of too much treat training.

Some dogs aren't interested in treats; they don't even eat very well - so, what do you do then? A good reward is you - your attention, your time, your praise. And most of the dogs I work with tend to work for that, and it's how I train most of my own dogs. So, reward is important, timing is important, but the reward can be anything from a nice biscuit, to a pat on the head, to a really big kiss and cuddle.

And I think it's important to work out what's best for your dog. If you do use treat training, you have to teach the dog to look at you instead of the food, and become more important than the food. And if you simply put your hand in your pocket, produce a treat, and the dog sits, that's not obedience.

That's "give me a biscuit and give me it now." So, treats do have their place, praises has its place, but it's important that you time it so that when your dog learns obedience, it's doing it because you said the word and it's thrilled to bits that it gets a reward at the end. Consistency, simple commands, try to get everyone in the family to use the same word so that the dog is not confused by that, and make sure that everybody expects the same standard.

I've seen situations where one owner lets the dog sit slightly sideways, the other one insists it sit straight, or to the different side, and the dog is simply confused. So, consistency, the right reward, steady short training sessions, lots and lots of praise, and that's how to teach your dog obedience. .