Make BIG Changes in Your Dogs Behavior a Little at a Time
hi everybody welcome to another Dunbar
Academy quick tip I’m Jamie Dunbar and
today’s quick tip is about how to train
your dog at the right difficulty level
so their obedience skills get better
with every session
every situation you can find yourself in
with your dog while somewhere along a
spectrum between what we like to call
the best possible training scenario and
the worst possible training scenario on
the best scenario side you would be
right next to your dog in a small area
free of distractions and you would have
food or a valued toy on hand to use as a
lure and a reward on the worst scenario
side your dog might be chasing a
squirrel through a food fight in a
crowded farmer’s market while you’re 50
yards away helping a friend carry a
couch on one side you can reasonably
expect your dog will probably listen to
you and on the other side you cannot
somewhere in the middle those two sides
meet your goal is to move that meeting
point over towards this more challenging
side so if you find yourself in that
sort of situation your dog just might
listen to you when you need them to in
order to do this you want to create
training scenarios that are at that
difficulty level where your dog
successfully does what you ask them to
do some but not all the time
now when it comes to difficulty level
there’s a bunch of different factors
that you’ll want to consider let’s start
with distance the farther you are from
your dog the less likely they are to
listen to you so ask your dog to sit
when they are right next to you did they
do it if not that’s where you need to
practice if they did listen to you great
take one big step away from them and try
again
still good take two steps and try again
then three you’ll probably find that
being just one or two steps away can
radically reduce the reliability if
that’s the case and that’s where you
want to practice just two or three steps
away from them if they get it right
reward them if they don’t make it easier
step back towards them and repeat the
request until they do get it right but
when they do don’t reward them at least
not at the level you would have rewarded
them if they got it right the first time
you can and should praise them but if
you had to make it easier for them and
they shouldn’t get the big payoff now
that they’ve just practiced it
successfully at a smaller distance go
back to being two or three steps away
and try it again
and there will be a much better chance
they will
do it on your first request they do
listen to you as a greater distance on
the first request give them a big reward
as an enthusiastic praise now distance
isn’t the only factor that’s worth
considering a lot of times you’ll want
your dog to maintain a behavior for a
specific duration of time you can
increase duration the same way you would
increase distance now distance and
duration are very easy to quantify but
there’s a third factor that’s no less
important but a little more subjective
this is the distraction factor and it
includes anything that you have to
compete with for your dog’s attention
all sorts of things can be distractions
especially anything that’s new or
different even things like your posture
for example your dog might not listen to
you while you are sitting in a chair
lying on a bed the location can be
distracting new places or areas with
crowds or lots of activity people other
dogs or their animals vehicles food can
be a huge distraction people doing
strange things or unfamiliar people
figure out where and when you lose
control and that’s where you need to
practice if you’re not having any
success tile it back a little remove
some distractions maybe even try a food
lure now if you do resort to a food lure
don’t give it to your dog as a reward
you don’t want to reward substandard
performances and a performance that
required a food lure is definitely
substandard instead put the lure back in
your pocket and try the exercise again
without it if they do it well the first
time then you can consider giving them
the food as a reward initially it’s
easiest to work on each of these three
areas separately as you progress you can
think about combining them so you might
try a scenario where your dog is at a
distance and you ask them to stay for a
longer duration and then maybe you might
add some distractions so to review one
every situation is different and some
are simply more challenging making it
much less likely your dog will listen to
you to work your way up to the
challenging situations by practicing at
the level where you start to lose
control of your dogs 3 reward your dog
when they get it right the first time if
you have to make it easy don’t
reward them instead try it again
immediately at the original difficulty
level and reward them if they succeed
for if you get frustrated focus on one
area at a time distance duration or
distractions as you get better you can
think about working on multiple fronts
at once thanks for watching Dunbar
Academy quick tips I’m Jamie Dunbar and
we will see you next time thanks for
watching this video if you’d like to
learn more make sure to visit Dunbar
academy.com and check out our selection
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courses if you’d like to watch more
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