You might want to read an earler post of mine on Actions speaking louder than words. The basic idea is that dogs don’t speak human languages and they never will, and we will never speak a dog’s language because as far as we know they don’t have one. However you can still train your dog with time and good consistent methods…
Dogs usually think about one thing and that is usually food (ok they sometimes think about sex at certain times of the year, and they always think about licking their bits and pieces but that’s nothing to do with it). So the best way to train a dog is by using food as a reward. Let me just say here and now that training a dog, especially a puppy should never involve violence of any kind. There is never any need to hit a dog unless you’re being attacked by one; and a dog will only attack you if you are attacking it, or it has been trained to do so usually.
Let’s move onto a simple training example here. I’ve already told you how i train a dog to sit. So let’s move onto the other more fun moves. Here is how you get your puppy to roll over. It’ll take some time so keep with it.
- Take your treat in your hand and pass it over the puppy’s head to make it sit. You must say sit also so the puppy will recognise the command when you don’t have a treat.
- When the puppy is seated give it the treat and a little stroke. Try to get it to stay seated. If it moves then pass the treat over the head again but don’t give it to them when they sit.
- Take the treat (or another one if your puppy stood up again) and bring it down to the floor, and say down. When the puppy gets this eventually give it the treat.
- Then it’s just a basic case of moving the treat over to whichever side you need the puppy to roll over to, and say roll over. It often doesn’t work for a long time, but it is important not to get impatient, just go off and do something else. Do not give the treat. You only ever reward behaviour you want. When the puppy doesn roll over, make a big fuss!
Tags: Puppy Training, training, treats