So yesterday we achieved zen with only one or two treats on the floor, today it’s a whole bowl of treats on the floor…and you thought Level 2 was a challenge!
Today’s Games
Time Allowance: Practice for 1-2 minute sessions and then take a break. Have a few sessions today.
Try fitting each short session into your routine; for example, while you wait for the kettle to boil, during the ad break of your TV show or while you wait for the computer to start up.
Really do keep sessions short on these exercises! The self-control bank account depletes fast and your dog will need some time to recuperate so make sure to give them a good break too.
Family Participation: This exercise is for adults only!
Top Tip for Today’s Training Games: Notice that we don’t ask our dog to do anything here at all – no talking!
This is about self-control – we are working on a default here so you never need to ask for polite behaviour when you have things your dog wants – he just does it!
Remember, if your dog gets stuck with any of our exercises this week, think of ways that you can make it easier for him to succeed and then build again more gradually.
Zen Level 3
add some food rewards to a small bowl or container (make sure you can cover the container with one hand)
begin to lower the container toward the floor, if your dog moves toward the container of food, bring the food back up to your lap or onto a chair or table
if your dog offers behaviours from his polite list continue to lower the container until you can get it on the floor
if your dog approaches the container cover it with your hand
if your dog paws or bites at your hand lift the container up off the floor for a couple of seconds and try to lower gradually again
cover the container until your dog shows at least one behaviour from your polite list
once uncovered, if your dog stays back from the container of food offer him a food reward
Work on this one until your dog can stay back off the container full of treats!
Was your dog able to achieve zen at level 1? Let’s try Level 2…
Today’s Games
Time Allowance: Practice for 1-2 minute sessions and then take a break. Have a few sessions today.
Try fitting each short session into your routine; for example, while you wait for the kettle to boil, during the ad break of your TV show or while you wait for the computer to start up.
Really do keep sessions short on these exercises! The self-control bank account depletes fast and your dog will need some time to recuperate so make sure to give them a good break too.
Family Participation: This exercise is for adults only!
Top Tip for Today’s Training Games: Notice that we don’t ask our dog to do anything here at all – no talking!
This is about self-control – we are working on a default here so you never need to ask for polite behaviour when you have things your dog wants – he just does it!
Remember, if your dog gets stuck with any of our exercises this week, think of ways that you can make it easier for him to succeed and then build again more gradually.
Now it’s really going to get tough as we move the food to the floor…
Zen Level 2
Practice a couple of rounds of Level 1 and then take your handful of food and place it on the floor – keep it covered!
place some food rewards on the floor
cover with your palm
when your dog moves away from your palm covering the food rewards, move your hand to the side
quickly re-cover the food if he approaches again
offer him one food reward if he can show any of the behaviours on his polite list
Your dog’s on switch isn’t on all the time – sometimes your dog is calm and sometimes he is not.
But most dogs will swing between extremes: the crazy to calm continuum.
Observe your dog on a normal day and try to pin point when he is at his calmest. What does that dog look like?
Now, think of him when he is at his craziest – what does that dog look like?
You might see your dog go up and down this scale over each and every day. For the most part, the closer his behaviour resembles the calmer end, the more acceptable his behaviour (to humans) will be – the easier he is to live with.
Today’s Games
Time Allowance:
This is an all day game – instead of individual sessions, when you think of it, watch your dog and catch him doing the right thing!
Family Participation:
Fun for all the family – kids might like to help out and be detectives for this game!
Always supervise child-dog interactions and make sure children learn to leave the dog alone while he works on his puzzle.
Top Training Tip for Today’s Training Game:
All you need is Training Mix today. Distribute little pots of your dog’s regular food around the house so that everyone in the family can participate and reward your dog as soon as they spot him being calm.
But, make sure to keep this food well out of his reach!
Catch your dog doing the right (relaxed) thing!
Today you will work on simply observing your dog and assessing how calm and polite he is.
Capturing means to catch the dog doing the behaviour we want and rewarding him – think of it like taking a photograph of what we want.
If you spot your dog being calm at any (and every) time today, approach him quietly without eye contact, praise him calmly and softly and feed him a couple of food rewards. Use pretty boring food rewards for this one to avoid getting him all excited.
The first few times you do this, your dog will probably follow you, nag you, want to get into training mode and play the game again.
Calmly and quietly ignore his protests – turn away from him, busy yourself, don’t give eye contact or talk to him, maybe stroke him a couple of times with long massage-like strokes down his back and then break away. And wait…
Wait for your dog to calm a little again and reward.
If your dog wants something like attention, or to go through a door, or his dinner, take a look at how calm he is. Wait for him to calm and reward him access to the things he wants.
Again, you may need to wait a bit…
Don’t ask your dog to calm down or offer polite behaviours – this is about him developing self-control – he needs to do it for himself. Just wait…
Doggie see, doggie do
Not only is your dog’s calmer behaviour important here, so is yours.
If you shout, force, or get excited your dog will find it more difficult to calm down so move slowly, don’t move your arms about, talk calmly, take deep breaths and sigh – all of this will help your dog to chill too (and it helps you to calm as well!).
When you are feeling down smiling can actually help you feel a little better. Your brain and your behaviour interact plus smiling might cause you to think of things that make you happy, so smiling can help you feel better.
Today we are going to start with teaching our dog’s body how to look more relaxed – just like with smiling, we can get this calm behaviour first and with practice the feeling of calmness will follow.
It’s important to note here that we want to teach the dog to choose more relaxed behaviour – you will not be helping your dog develop calmer behaviour and feelings if you coerce or force your dog.
You probably wouldn’t feel too much better if I physically made you smile or forced you to do it.
And what’s more, by associating the behaviour of being calm with something the dog likes, we can increase the pleasantness associated with being chilled out.
(Imagine I gave you your favourite treat food every time you smiled – yep, you would be smiling a whole lot more and you would be feeling a whole lot better too!)
Today’s Games
Time Allowance:
Practice for 1-2 minute sessions and then take a break. Have a few sessions today.
Try fitting each short session into your routine; for example, while you wait for the kettle to boil, during the ad break of your TV show or while you wait for the computer to start up.
Family Participation:
Kids are often great dog trainers. Teach each child how to lure safely.
If your dog is mouthy, jumpy or likely to get over-excited it might be best for you to get the behaviours established and then bring in the kids to help with practice.
Always supervise child-dog interactions and make sure children learn to leave the dog alone when eating his rewards.
Top Tip for Today’s Training Game:
Work on settling exercises when your dog is pretty relaxed and chilled. Wait for the entire household to be quieter and practice exercises when it’s easier to be calm.
You will need:
Training Mix
your dog’s calm-mat
Using your dog’s calm-mat
Use your dog’s new towel/mat/blanket as the calm-mat for these exercises.
Your dog’s new calm-mat is going to become a sign that signals your dog to chill out so we need to use it carefully.
At the start of training only have your dog’s calm-mat out and available during training. It’s important that your dog’s mat isn’t out when your dog is excited or when exciting things are going on, for example, guests arrive or it’s time for walkies.
Beginner Level Games:
Teaching ‘down’
Teaching your dog to lie down is the first stage toward giving them behaviours that help with calming.
For this exercise, this week, we don’t need to get lying down on a verbal cue (great if you already have it or if you work that far this week!) but instead your dog’s mat will become the signal for your dog to be calm and lie down.
First task is to teach your dog to lie down on their new mat.
We practiced lots of luring last week and now we can apply that here too.
Practice working on this behaviour on your dog’s calm-mat. With plenty of practice, your dog will soon start to lie down on his mat, without you needing to ask him.
At the same time we are teaching our dog to lie down, we will also teach our dog to get up and go about his business again.
Once your dog lies down on his mat, reward him four times, one food reward after another, in position by feeding him in between his front legs.
Say your release cue (it can be anything you like such as ‘go’, ‘OK’, ‘all done’ etc.) and then roll or toss one food reward off the mat to encourage your dog to get up.
Does your dog already lie-down on cue? Try laying out your dog’s mat and ask them to lie-down on it, reward and repeat five times.
If that goes well try these games:
Find your mat
After practicing down and releasing your dog increase the challenge. Lay your dog’s mat out and wait for your dog to get onto the mat, without asking him – if you are lucky your dog might lie down straight away, but if not don’t worry.
Try to build toward this instead:
dog stands on the mat, reward off the mat – repeat x10
dog sits on the mat, reward off the mat – repeat x10
dog sits on mat, reward by luring into a down (then reward three more times between his front feet and release) – repeat x10
wait for your dog to come back to the mat and wait – if he lies down reward x4 and release and repeat
When your dog is lying down on his mat, offer the first reward by luring your dog’s head slightly to one side. This will encourage your dog to flop over onto one hip – this is a more settled position.
Reward your dog with three food rewards between his front legs and then say your release cue and reward off the mat.
Most types of dogs have been selectively bred to be curious and interested about the world around them.
Not surprising then that we need to actually teach them how to switch off, particularly as our pet dogs are unlikely to be carrying out the jobs for which they were originally selected.
Finding the ‘on’ switch for your dog is probably pretty easy – indeed, your dog can probably turn that one on himself without any problems! But finding the off-switch can be a little trickier – and at times, especially surrounding exciting events, may seem impossible.
When we describe a dog who is easy to live with, one of the attributes that has to be close to top of the list is a dog who settles himself, who can calm himself and who can easily swing between the on switch and the off switch.
Because ‘on’ can seem to be a default setting for many dogs, we need to put the effort into teaching the dog how to switch to ‘off’.
Remember, being ‘on’ can become addictive so we this can be a real challenge for some pets – no better time to get started on training than now!
What do I need for Week 2?
a new mat/towel/blanket – one your dog hasn’t had before
Training Mix
your dog’s collar and leash
Kong toys or similar for pacifying
Week 2 Training Games
up & down
settle & matwork
capturing calmness
Park Your Pup
massage
relaxation
What’s my dog learning?
I am learning to settle myself, even after excitement or activity and when my human is ignoring me.
I am learning to better tolerate frustration so can wait patiently
I am learning that I can’t have all the things I want when I want them
Chewing on my stuff helps me to calm, like a toddler sucking their thumb
When a human comes near me when I have something yummy, I am learning that good things happen and that I don’t need to guard
Learning to calm and settle myself can help to prevent serious behavioural and physical disorders
My human can have lots of peace and quiet while I settle quietly
There’s a lot to this relaxation-business…
You can download a more printer friendly, but abbreviated version of this week’s exercises here.
Wohoo! Let’s start preparing for the start of our plans on Monday – here’s your first task:
Make a Training Mix
Rather than introduce lots and lots of treats for our training program, we will use our dogs’ regular, everyday food in our games.
But, no more getting their food for free – this program will encourage your dog to work for each piece!
No matter what you feed your dog you will be able to use this food, rather than in a food bowl, for many of our games over the entire program.
Here’s our video showing you how to use your dog’s regular food for training games:
Dry food e.g. kibble:
measure out your dog’s daily rations and place in a lunchbox or bag
(remove about 5-10% if you go with the higher-cal option below)
Option 1 (low-cal)
add a chunk of your dog’s favourite such as tripe (dried or frozen), chicken, ham, hotdog or cheese
(your dog won’t get to eat this treat)
Option 2 (higher-cal)
add a little of your dog’s favourite treats, chopped up small (third fingernail size)
seal the bag or lunchbox and mix the contents
leave in the fridge overnight
next day, everything will smell yummier!
Wet food e.g. raw, tinned:
measure out your dog’s meal as normal into a container
if you feed whole organs, cut muscle meat into small pieces or mince the meat
stuff food into a Kong toy or similar – this can be hidden for sniffing games or offered to the dog to lick a bit as a reward during training games
administer wet food on a wooden spoon as a training reward
freeze spoonfuls of wet food in an icecube tray – little frozen nuggets of wet food are great for sniffing games and energising games
If you are worried about handling wet or raw food during training exercises, keep a pair of surgical gloves with your training-mix so that you are always ready to reward desired behaviour.
You’ve signed up and are getting ready, but what’s this training program really about?
Our Train Your Dog Month 2016 program is all about foundation skills – these are the ones that you will build your continued training upon.
So often we go straight into the sexy stuff without paying attention to the training that supports our dog’s life long learning – that can be why our training sometimes crumbles and collapses.
Spending a little time (remember, just ten minutes each day) putting these basics in place provides you and your dog the perfect foundation on which to build.
Reality Check
As important as these exercises and having the right foundation are, it isn’t a magic-wand!
Just signing up for our program will not ‘fix’ any behaviour problems you might experience with your dog. But, the exercises we will introduce will help work on some of the root causes to training and behaviour issues from pulling on lead to aggression.
The plan
Each week is themed and we will post three-to-five different exercises for you to work on during that week.
Every couple of days or so, we will post a new exercise with options to suit you at various stages of training. We will provide video and printer friendly versions too so that everyone can participate.
Remember, just ten minutes a day but if you want to do more that’s OK too!
Be ready for your first plan on Monday and Happy 2016!
Ringing in 2016 means it’s time to start getting ready for this month’s dog training challenge!
What do I need for Week 1?
your dog’s regular food
some rewards, treats and chews
lunchbox and resealable plastic bags e.g. ZipLoc
lead, collar, ID tag, harness, long line – if you plan to practice some of our exercises in public places or in unsecured areas
Kong toys or similar (if you don’t have a Kong toy for your dog please consider getting at least one – they are the best dog toys and we love them!)
treat activity balls, Kong Wobbler, Dog Pyramid or similar (don’t worry if you don’t have these – we will look at alternatives too)
household items such as boxes, plant pots, doormats, tubs, muffin or cupcake pan etc.
disposable items such as cardboard tubes (from toilet rolls or kitchen rolls), wrapping paper, Pringles or similar can, lunchboxes, empty butter, yoghurt or cream cheese tubs with lids, egg boxes, tea towels, cardboard, plastic bottles etc.
Sounds weird? Well, we’re going to keep you guessing for a couple more days!
Your dog’s on switch isn’t on all the time – sometimes your dog is calm and sometimes he is not.
AniEd Ireland 