DSD Training Videos

The best way to teach a dog to be quiet on command is to teach them to speak on command.   That’s the only way you can practice telling them to be quiet.

When we’re heeling, we use a lure to maintain their attention, and reward them for accurate body-positioning.

Polite greetings take practice.  It’s a good idea to train your dog to automatically sit when you meet another person, especially if they’re with another dog.

Crawling, jumping and clapping are all likely to make your dog break a stay, so proof for them.  Occasionally give a new position command, to make sure they’re still listening to you.

Proofing your dog’s stay is a never ending process, but you want to start as simply as possible.

Putting a behavior on command requires repetition.  The only way to practice shushing is to practice barking.  Use an accomplice and an appropriate stimuli to train the dog to bark on command.

You don’t want to have to yell at your dog.  Issue your first reprimand in a quiet voice and reward them if they do it the first time.  If they don’t listen, then use your harsh voice or a hand signal.

By slowly increasing the level of distraction and distance from your dog, you can create a super-effective verbal sit command that works anywhere, anytime.

Walking around, skipping, getting down on the ground; all of these things will tempt a dog to break their stay.  Practice with your dog or they won’t stand a chance.

With a combination of enthusiastic praise and timely reprimands, it’s easy to maintain your dog’s attention during a sit stay.

This first step is very easy, but vitally important.  If you don’t actively train your dog to enjoy having their collar grabbed, they’re going to make problems for you later on.

Food treats make for very effective lures, but you don’t want your dog to be constantly mouthing or pawing your hand.  “Off” is a very simple but, incredibly critical exercise

If you want your dog’s stays to be reliable, you need to practice them.  Slowly introduce distance and distractions to test your dog’s stays.  Pay constant attention and use lots of feedback to keep them in position.

Your dog will quickly learn that the only way to get you walking again is if they sit down.  Once you can string together a few consecutive steps, you’ll have a dog that walks calmly on leash.

It’s much better to teach a rock-solid distance sit, but a good distance recall can also be very useful.

A reliable sit-command that works anywhere and anytime, at a distance and with distractions, is the most valuable tool in training.  But training is very context dependent, so it takes a lot of practice.

Keep waiting, even if it takes awhile to get started.  Your dog will learn much better if they figure it out than if you try to lure them.

Introduce distance commands slowly, and don’t push your dog too hard too fast.  Maintain a level of training which is challenging, but allows your dog to succeed the majority of the time.

In crowded urban areas, there are lots of distractions for your dog.  Give them time to get used to new and unfamiliar surroundings.  Classically condition them to enjoy different environments.

We don’t want our dog to lunge on leash, so we ignore the behavior and wait for them to stop.  As soon as they stop we reward them, and soon they’ll figure out what you’re looking for.

Your dog is likely to get over-excited while meeting people on the street.  So repeat it over and over again until they’re calm enough that you can have them sit to say hello.

A dog that doesn’t settle down on command is going to be a pain to live with.  It can be very useful to train several  down positions, depending on how long you want them to stay down.

Be ready to reward your dog at the right time.  If your dog is not acting like you want it to, watch them closely and be ready to promptly reward as soon as they do something you do want.

“Off” is a crucial command.  You don’t want your dog to constantly lick, mouth or paw your hand, just because your holding a treat.  It’s easy to do, start with a second, then reward progressively longer durations.

Most owners ignore their dog’s good behavior and punish their bad behavior.  In All or None Reward Training, we do the opposite, ignoring the bad and rewarding the good.

An effective trainer can switch immediately from sweet praise to stern reprimand.  Use the tone of your voice to let your puppy now when you like what they’re doing and when you don’t.

When older dogs get stressed out, they stop listening to humans.  Always take the time to ensure that your dog is comfortable with their environment.  Lots of soothing praise and food treats will help them adjust to unfamiliar surroundings.

Dogs will follow you as long as you make it fun.  Make it a game and turn around every time they get ahead of you.  Clap yell and run away if they lag behind.

If your puppy gets stuck in position, kneel down, scratch the ground and call to them.  Pulling on the leash is only going to make them more anxious and less likely to follow.

One of the biggest problems people have with older dogs is excessive energy.  The best way to practice settling your dog down on command is to practice getting them amped up.

A loose piece of food makes a powerful challenge to your dog’s stay, assuming they already know the “Off” command of course.

Socialization is a life long process.  If  your dog doesn’t have regular interactions with new people and dogs, they will slowly become anti-social to strangers.

If you want to have the ability to settle your dog down in any situation, you have to keep practicing this exercise lots of times, in lots of different places, with lots of different distractions.

Sitting is a less stable position than lying down, so you’ll need to pay even more attention to your dog’s body cues when you’re proofing their stays.

Slowly build up more distractions, duration & distance.  Make sure they understand that their stay continues even if you’re moving around, or petting another dog.

Teaching distance commands can take a lot of focus.  You need to concentrate on the dog, and you may need a lot of energy to keep their attention from farther away.

It’s easy to lure a dog to stop barking: simply present a treat for them to sniff.  They can’t bark and sniff at the same time.  You needn’t always reward them with the treat, but you should praise them as soon as they stop barking.

As soon as your dog learns a new command, you should work on phasing out the need for a food lure.  You can continue to use it as a reward, but over time, you should slowly reduce the frequency.

If you challenge your dog too much, they may go floppy on you.  This position of helplessness means you need to be gentle with them.  Getting angry will only further encourage their submissive posture.

Controlled heeling is no easy task.  At the beginning it’s a good idea to separate the turns from the straight-aways.  Once they’ve mastered that, you can slowly start to combine the two.

An older dog is no excuse.  If you don’t want your dog to bark at the door, teach them to “Shush” on command.  Challenge extended!

Games motivate everyone and make training fun and exciting.  Just make sure you always maintain control of the dog so they don’t get over-excited.

This beagle knows that the word “Stand” means something, but it’s not sure what.  To lure a stand, you may have to lower your hand a little to prevent them from sitting.

After you’ve mastered off-leash heeling, the move to on-leash heeling is easy.  Don’t let the leash get tight, or you’ll end up with a leash-puller who ignores you.

Count how many verbal commands of hand signals it takes for your dog to  Sit Down Sit Stand Down Stand.  This way you can measure your progress, and see how their obedience is effected in different training environments.

It’s very important to practice taking and returning preferred objects from your puppy, thereby showing them that they don’t need to be protective of their stuff.

Build distance commands literally step by step.  If they creep towards you, try practicing with them at the top of some stairs or behind a gate.

It’s very important to have a command which lets the dog know when it is okay to take food from your hand, otherwise any food you carry will be fair game.

If you lure your dog onto their side to settle down, it will be harder for them to get up quickly.

Jasper, the full grown Rottweiler needs to work a little on his manners.  It would take a little work, but Jasper could make a wonderful companion dog.

Attention is vital for training.  With it, everything is exponentially easier.  Build your “Watch Me” command a little at a time, until you can practice it at the park.

For prompt position changes to verbal commands, you should give your dog extra reinforcement.   Phase out the use of food rewards, so that you only give food treats for their best performances.

When you lure a stand you should lower your hand a little bit to prevent your dog from sitting.

If your reprimand isn’t changing their behavior, then repeating it will only desensitize them.  An abrupt and startling reprimand is the most effective.  If you do take hold of the dog, be sure to hold them until you can praise them for being good.

At higher levels of training you can use a very quiet voice to get a heightened level of attention from your dog.  A little whisper voice makes a powerful reward.

Sit Stand & Down: a minimum of three positions are required for effective dog training. 

Challenge your dog to beat their longest stay.  Start with easy, short duration stays and build up slowly, practicing on whatever is most difficult for your dog.

It’s always unfair to punish a dog more than you praise it.  Maintain a positive training atmosphere by praising them when they’re acting well, which is most of the time.

This exercise trains the dog to pay attention to you while walking.  They never know when you’ll stop and they’ll have to sit and look at you again to get you going.

Fine tuning your recalls and sits takes practice.  With a big dog you’ll want to extend your hand out to the dog to stop them before they come barreling into you.  Use big exaggerated hand signals to show your dog what you want.

Training a dog to walk politely on leash is very easy, but not if you’re trying to go somewhere.

Punishment is an important part of training, but don’t overdo it.  An instructive reprimand will let your dog know that they’re getting it wrong, and  also let’s them know how they can fix it.

This smart little Beagle things the exercise  is a little more complicated than it actually is.

Keep your puppy interested in training.  If their attention begins to lag, ask them to do something simple and give them a treat.  Be aware of your surroundings and if you’re having trouble, avoid distractions.

It’s much easier to control your dog when it’s looking at you.  Fortunately, it is incredible easy to teach your dog to look at you with simple Reward Training.  As they figure it out, ask for longer and longer looks.

Playing with one other dog will not be sufficient for your pup’s socialization.  Instead, they should meet, and play with as many other puppies and dogs as possible.

If you want your dog to be calm and confident, you have to first give them time to get used to new people and places, then you have to  praise and reward them for their good behavior.

If you lose your dog lags behind, the best way to get them to follow is to make noise and hurry away from them.  Use food lures to keep their attention, but only reward them with a treat when they do an excellent job.

Heeling on-leash is no easy task.  If you teach off-leash following and heeling first, you won’t end up with a leash puller that is only “under your control” because of a physical restraint

Dogs are programmed to read out body signals.  If you want them to truly learn verbal commands, you must be careful to avoid giving any visible signals at the same time.  Give the hand signal immediately afterwards if your dog doesn’t respond.

As your dog gets the hand of staying, you can phase out the running commentary and introduce more silly behavior.  Go slowly and increase the challenge a little bit at a time to maintain the momentum of success.

If your dog jumps up you must let them know it’s not okay.  Stop walking and tell them “Off.”  If necessary, push them down and yell, but be sure to praise them when they stop jumping.

All or None Reward Training can start slowly, but it’s always worth the wait.  The longer it takes your dog to figure out what you want, the more they’ll understand it when they do get it.

Before you can add a sit to your recall, you have to make sure that their sit is rock-solid.  Otherwise you run the risk of punishing a good recall because of a bad sit.

As your dog learns to maintain a loose leash you can start stringing more and more steps together.  Keep praising the appropriate behavior, and correcting the bad behavior and soon you’ll be walking your dog happily on leash

If you want to have focused attention on-command, you need to let them know when the “Watch Me” is over.  Telling them to “Relax” then becomes a reward for their good attention.  Feel free to use a lure to get them focused, so long as you phase it out.

After taking a single step, the dog is likely to get excited and may start pulling on the leash again.  Keep praising the loose leash and gently jerking the tightened leash until they leave it loose for several seconds.

In order to teach your dog to “Stay” you must also teach them “Go Play” or “Free.”  If you tell them to stay indefinitely they’ll learn that the duration of a stay is up to them.

Exciting distractions such as other dogs will undermine your dog’s obedience training, so it’s important to incorporate them into training.

By turning around after rewarding the dog for looking at us, we can easily train it to actively make eye contact with us.

“Steady” means we want a loose leash.  If they tug on the leash, say “Steady” and tug back.  If the leash is loose, praise the dog.  If the leash remains loose for several seconds take a single step and repeat.

Laura Enos demonstrates how to keep the leash loose, and give your dog a warning when they begin to stray.  If they’re not paying attention, give them a warning, and if they don’t respond, try yanking the leash or abruptly changing directions.

Letting the little dogs off-leash first gives them a chance to explore and get comfortable.  Some pups are naturally shyer, and need more time to build up their  confidence.

Practice your distance sits while your dog is roaming, sniffing, and not paying particular attention to you.  If you’re in an unconfined place, you can practice with a very long leash.

Children often have trouble telling a puppy “Off” in a way that really tells the dog that they’re behavior is unaccetable.  Help your child understand that they need to yell loudly when the dog pulls on clothing or mouths them inappropriately.

Walking through a new environment can be very stressful for a dog, especially if there are other dogs or strangers around.  Take time to settle down in unfamiliar places and reward your dog for acting calmly.

Distance commands take lots of practice.  Build up distance step-by-step and make sure you continue to praise it when they get it right.

The level of reinforcement should depend on the quality of behavior.  If your dog is looking very cute, or is being attentive, then give them a treat in addition to praise.  If they’re only acting okay, then praise alone is sufficient.

With all dog training, the key is practice and persistence. Practice often and in different settings, and if you give a command, persist until they follow it.

It can be helpful to have two people teach distance commands.  One person can stay next to the dog to give rewards or lure the dog if necessary.

We don’t want a dog that only listens when we hold its collar, so now we ask the dog to sit before we touch it.  We  still take the collar after they’ve sat, so that when we reward, we continue to reinforce their love of collar grabs.

Once we’ve taught off-leash following, off leash heeling, and indoor on-leash heeling we’re finally ready to try heeling on-leash outside.  By taking small steps, you can build up to walking in the most crowded and excited environments.

Your dog can’t follow you if you’re not leading.  Walking away from your dog is the only way they can follow, and if you yell and clap and run away they’re likely to chase after you.

Once the dog enjoys having their collar grabbed, introduce a sit command.  Don’t let them go back to playing until they’ve sat for you.

Ian & his malamute Omaha practice a little heeling and distance obedience at the park.  SIRIUS Puppy Training Classic is dedicated to Omaha.

The most effective reprimands are short and startling.  A single, abrupt correction is much more effective than repetitive corrections that become gradually more severe.

Lying down can be a sign of anxiety.  To get them moving again kneel down and lure them from their level, all while maintaining a loose leash.

By varying the duration of positions you can begin working on their stays.  This also provides great practice for  getting their attention back after an extended down or stay.

Being able to alternate immediately between praise & reprimand according to a dog’s behavior is the most fundamental skill in dog training.