TIPS AND ADVICE TO HELP YOUR PUPPY LEARN THE BASICS OF TRAINING.
Megana Nedungadi, clinical animal behaviourist at Dogs Trust, advises on training puppies. Here are her top 10 tips.
1 PERFECT TIMING
Before the session starts, make sure your puppy’s been to the toilet, and isn’t really hungry.
2 PLAN AHEAD
Plan exactly what you’re going to teach your puppy, and practise without him first of all. This may sound weird, but if you make sure you know what you’re doing, and you’ve gone through the motions physically first, before bringing in your puppy, you’ll be less likely to confuse him, or get confused yourself! Don’t do too much at once — keeping it simple means your puppy can be confident and get it right. You can then progress slowly, but surely!
3 LOCATION, LOCATION
Start your training sessions in a calm place you’re both very familiar with, so you can both concentrate without too many distractions.
4 MOTIVATE AND REWARD
Always have a reward your puppy will really want and enjoy; this will help to motivate him to find out what he needs to do to earn it, and means he’ll always really enjoy the session. Choose something he loves, whether that is food or toys. If you’re using food, try cutting your chosen treat into small pieces about the size of a fingernail and count them out into 10s, so you can be sure to give your dog a break after every set of 10 practices!
5 WEIGHT WATCHING
If you are worried that your puppy might gain too much weight because of the extra treats, you can use a portion of his daily food ration as part of his training treats.
6 RING THE CHANGES!
Always use a good variety of treats, as this will keep your dog interested, and means you can use different types of food at different times in your training. In general, treats are useful for calmer, slower exercises, where you want your dog to stay relaxed, and toys/games are useful for more energetic exercises, such as recall, where the dog comes running to you. You can enjoy a great game together, which will encourage him to want to be with you!
7 SHORT AND SWEET
Keep sessions short, and end with a game — counting out your treats helps as it means you won’t just keep going.
8 KEEP COOL
If you or your puppy are getting confused or frustrated during training, stop the session. Ask your puppy to do something he knows really well so you can reward that, and end the session with a game. Next time you train, go back to the stage where he was getting it right for a little longer, before trying to move on again. Your puppy might just need a little longer to build confidence, or you may need to practise without him again to make sure you’re giving clear instructions.
9 HAVE FUN!
Only train your puppy if you’re both relaxed and in the mood. If you’ve had a tough day, just enjoy having fun together, and wait until you’re feeling more relaxed — it means you’ll both get the most out of each session, and always enjoy training together!
10 MAKE A RECORD
It can be incredibly useful to film yourself training your dog, as you’ll be able to look back and see how you were both doing, what kinds of things he was trying in his attempt to work out how to get the reward, and whether you could have given the reward differently. Plus, it’s always nice to look back and see you and your puppy bonding and to be able to record your progress!