Is your dog making you crazy? Are you dealing with jumping up, chewing, barking or pulling on leash? Maybe all of the above? Or are those four things just the tip of the iceberg?
Here's 6 things you can do right to change your dog's behavior now:
- Establish consistent rules - before you start anything make sure everyone in the family is reading from the same play book. No amount of training is going to work unless the entire family is following and enforcing the same rules. Get it together!
- Reward the good stuff - yes, the essence of positive reinforcement is rewarding the behaviors we want so our dog offers those behaviors more frequently. But are you doing this when you aren't "training" or "practicing?" Start rewarding your dog all of the time, and you will see those behaviors more often.
- Ignore the bad stuff - if it isn't unsafe, what's the risk? Try ignoring the undesirable behavior and it may go extinct. But read that link closely, if you are not prepared to really and truly ignore a behavior, it's not going to go away.
- Time out! - at your wit's end? Calmly and firmly give your dog a "time out." Pick out a spot - contrary to popular belief the crate is just fine - and place your dog there for a time out. Time outs are not loud, scary or very long: the point of a time out is social isolation, only for 30 seconds or at most a couple of minutes. Make the connection between the undesired behavior and the time out clear, and you'll see an improvement. As a bonus, you'll get a chance to regroup yourself.
- Exercise - are you seeing a lot of rambunctious behavior? Chances are your dog is not getting enough exercise and is a little bored. Dogs, especially adolescents from 6 months to 2 years old, need a lot of exercise. Play some fetch, find a place to let your dog run, trying feeding from toys like the kong, canine genius or tug-a-jug, and you'll hit the daily double: a tired dog and a happy human.
- Training - this is a trainer's website. You knew this was coming, right? But training is on this list for a specific reason. There's a lot more to training than just teaching a dog new behaviors. Good dog training helps you learn how to communicate with your dog. You'll learn how to read your dog's cues more effectively and how to send her more effective cues yourself.
I'm not going to say these steps are easy to do, but they are pretty easy to understand. Pick two out, give them a shot, and let us know how it goes.
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Number 4 Time Out!
Eric,
Good advice if you are at your wit's end, then yes a time out is good for the owner to regroup. According to Dr. Dan Tortora, "Help This Animal is Driving Me Crazy", social isolation as a punisher would perhaps decrease all behaviors, even the good ones. I think it is very hard on the dog to make the connection between the undesired and desired behavior. Is seeing an improvement just fall out? I'm all for TO for owners, and using all the other steps you outline, but as a teaching tool, maybe not. Try it on some humans, and have them practice on you as well as the opposite of the training game in the negative - see how it feels. I much rather be specific with the dog.
time outs & crate games
I'm a fan of Susan Garrett's Crate Games (dvd is super duper), so my dogs actually think the "time out" in their crates is a game... just time to chill before the fun begins again :)
The more advanced they become with the games, you end up being able to send them to their crate, door open to chill, while you take a breather and go back to the drawing board to figure out a way to communicate what you'd prefer.
Sometimes maybe its how you frame the picture?
I also like one of her quotes:
“a dog is a reflection of their owner’s ability to train” I also firmly believe that “your students are a reflection of your ability to teach.”
happy-houndz.blogspot.com cheers, kate
Hi Eric, I had to respond
Hi Eric,
I had to respond to one of the comments your received. I agree with your approach entirely. I think that owner frustration with the inability to stop an unwanted behavior, poses a greater risk to both the dog (i.e., harsh, anger-based punishments) and the human-animal bond, than a timeout. We must realize that as practitioners it is our job to address the problems presented by both ends of the leash and address them quickly, effectively and with thought to the long-term repercussions our decisions might have for the dog.
Liz Catalano, MA, CPDT, CDBC www.thelittlewhitedog.com
hi i think that time out for
hi i think that time out for a short time in a crate is good. they are tops for all sorts of situations. the worry i have on using crate is that people seem to think that it is a way of popping the dog away for hours. i think as trainers we must explain that an 8 hour day in a crate and back in at night is not time out, just dam right cruelty. i am finding more and more people using it this way. i am in Australia is this just over here that the problem lies?
Time outs and crates
A big part of the time out is for human, maybe I didn't stress that enough in the post. Given a choice between a person shouting "shut up!" over and over at a dog that is demand-barking or a couple of well-timed 30 second timeouts, I'll take the "risk." Telling people to ignore bad behavior is great (and as a matter of fact, I did) but not everyone is capable, either because of temperament (the human's) or practical concerns (the dog is jumping on Grandma), so I offer an alternative for when it is just too much.
@spirit - overusing the crate is a common problem. I tell people 4 hours, hoping that if they fudge it won't get past 6. It's a thorny issue as many of the people that have to leave a dog alone for all day for work don't have money for walkers or day care. Sometimes helping them set up a larger "safe room" with baby gates can at least mitigate the issue.
P.S. Just ordered a copy of "Crate Games."
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Eric Goebelbecker
added value besides TO of the Crate Games dvd are
Eric,
I hope you enjoy it and would love to hear feedback on the games. I learnt so many things from that DVD, not agility related, useful in everyday life like:
1-importance of setting up their environments where they will clearly see the "transfer of value" Susan Garrett calls it of doing the "desirable" thing. Equally, you want them to fail as with everything in life, we learn through our failures too....and the beauty is that consequence is never mean, nasty, physically or emotionally abusive :) It's just quiet, and boring. You'll see dogs "fail" in the video and how she handles it, then you get to see her set things up for them again ensuring she makes the most rewarding behaviour (your desirable one) the "no brainer" for the dog to choose. No magic edit, you see the real deal.
2-it's awesome for building emotional control for out of control dogs of any age, even whiny dogs, bored and fearful dogs. It builds confidence as they have free will to think, and by there being no fear of making mistakes, they thrive.
3- uses food & toys & life rewards so the dog can't wait to engage (my dogs were not great tuggers so I replaced tugging with throwing balls, hiding stuffed toys, playing chase me shadow handling games, anything my dogs found rewarding)
4- builds foundation for awesome chill outs, stays and distraction work, and great for "collar grab" desensitization along with recalls.
5-I've transfered playing the games to doorways, their mats, their beds, car, on a walk, agility, the learned components can be transferred any and everywhere and used in different situations, it's invaluable to me.
6-Best part is it's interactive and we can play it inside on a rainy day or when we're snowed in :)
thank you for your blog posts, they make my day.
happy-houndz.blogspot.com cheers, kate
Crate Games
I'm looking forward to it! I saw Susan's "bad dog trainer" video and became a fan.
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Eric Goebelbecker
re: ignore ie...the "look away"- my dogs taught me that one
3- re: ignore bad behaviour
I remember going to one of Patricia McConnell's seminars and her mentioning the "look away" or "yawn" something dogs use amongst themselves (and to us humans) to let the other know to chill out ... you're over the top, your behaviour is unbecoming ... a polite way to ignore the rude behaviour.
Soon after I remember noticing my dogs actually using that tactic on me :)
One morning when we were out for the 'last chance to pee" before I leave for work; I repeated myself a few times and then each dog took their turn and gave me the "look away". I totally cracked up laughing and could see what they were trying to tell me = I needed to chill. They knew the routine and if I would just be quiet, quit nagging, they could do their business so we could get back to the apt and they'd be able to get to the mound of Kongs waiting for them while I went to work :P
I lovingly use the "look away" now as much as they do. It works for them and on me :P
Still makes me smile when I realize "they got me"!
happy-houndz.blogspot.com cheers, kate
Great blog - thanks
Said so concisely and well - I agree with it all but you put it so succinctly - I think I might print that out and use it for my training class! Thanks!