Article Title: How To Train A Dog Effectively
Author: Jason Ryan
A crucial and beneficial task to undertake with your dog is to
train it properly. Training allows you to connect with your dog
through communication. This connection is vital in directing
your dog to follow your commands, as well as establishing a
good lifelong relationship. Training is not the panacea for all
behavior issues, but it's a good foundational start.
Dogs are definitely social beings, but behave like wild animals
when not provided the proper training. This means your dog will
bite you, fight with other dogs, dig in the yard, bark too
much, damage your property and dirty your home. These canine
behavioral issues are actually normal dog activities, but the
timing and the subject of focus is all wrong. To illustrate
this, a dog must do its business outside, but does not wait and
goes on the rug instead. Perhaps the dog does not just bark at a
suspicious prowler, but barks the entire night instead. Or, the
dog prefers to gnaw on your shoes instead of the toys you've
provided. The critical message you must impart to your dog is
that these behaviors need to be redirected to the proper time
and place.
Training establishes the pecking order or "Alpha status" too.
Your dog shows respect to you just through simple compliance
for commands like "sit" and "come." However, you and your dog
should derive rewards and fun times from training. Proper
training makes living together a pleasurable and rewarding
experience. The well-trained canine actually can be given more
freedom and is a much more confident pet as compared to a dog
with no boundaries on behavior.
Your home is the venue where you should do the training. Don't
pick an area with a lot of distractions for your dog; it
should be an area your dog is used to. Once you are confident
that your dog has mastered a few compliance commands, you can
then move on to different locations. Remember that you want
people who visit to see your dog comply with all your commands.
What's the point if your dog sits on command in the backyard,
but does not do so when visitors are at your home? The big test
of dog training success is to see your dog respond to commands
in public places.
Dog obedience training lessons should be short on time, but
long on results. Scheduling long and meticulous dog training
sessions will only become tedious and unproductive in the end.
The best way to schedule dog training is to integrate it within
day-to-day activities. Your dog training sessions should be
structured so that both you and your pet derive benefit from
it. Integrate dog training sessions during activities your dog
loves, and your dog will associate those favorite activities
with the training. From your dog's perspective, it should see
that everything is training and training is everything.
You will find that the most profound theme in that dog training
should be rewarding to your dog for the appropriate responses.
The speed at which the dog learns is directly associated with
the frequency of rewards. This means that practice will involve
rewarding good behaviors in quick succession. Never take your
dog's good behavior lightly and make sure that praise is given
quickly. If a dog barks too much, it always gets attention, but
we fail to notice our dog acting properly at times. It is human
nature to focus on the bad behaviors and ignore the good. But
with dogs, a system of proper actions and quick rewards are
vital for the prevention of future problems.
Dogs get exasperated too when all they hear is, "No, get down,
bad dog!" The constant nagging also has a tendency to make a
dog apathetic to your commands. If there is a consistent system
of rewards for appropriate behavior, then when your dog behaves
badly and gets scolded, it has a greater impact. Remember to
not just scold your dog, but show what you desire from it and
immediately reward the behavior when done right. For example,
you can show your dog its own toys right after scolding it for
chewing on some household item. You can get excited about the
dog's toys and give a reward when the dogs play with them.
The tone of your voice, if used properly, is all that is needed
for correcting bad behavior. Stick to reprimands that are
concise, short and quick, and avoid nagging. Do not scold your
dog if you have not caught the wrong behavior right away, as it
will have little meaning after some time has passed. Late
reprimands do little good and can even worsen the wrong
behavior in your dog. Inappropriate reprimanding can make your
dog aggressive, timid, afraid of the raised hand, and apt to
chew and bark excessively.
About The Author: Jason Ryan is a longtime dog lover and pet
owner. He has a great deal of experience raising dogs, and has
written numerous articles on how to train dogs. Visit the
website http://www.training
effective dog training guides.
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