The best way to begin your dog or puppy training is with rewards, praise and affection. The rewards strengthen the patterns of good dog behavior and the praise and affection creates the bond with your pup. Once lessons are learn’t you can stop the rewards and just give affection and praise. Punishment creates fear and frustration and if a pup is not responding to your command, it could be the tone of your voice being too harsh, or your body language may be showing aggression.
Some times you do have to give a reprimand to stop your pup from continuing any bad puppy behavior, or to stop it from hurting itself. Always use the same words and use a harsher tone. Physical punishment is undesirable, as your pup will not know why you are hurting it and may become aggressive in defense. If you do have to touch your pup, use the same approach as its mother and create a ‘mouth’ with your hand and tap the pup on the back of its head and say ‘no’. The mother grabs the pup by the scruff and gives it a shake to teach it manners.
The owner should be the trainer of the pup, or dog, but once lessons of obedience are learn’t, include all family members, so that the pup knows that the whole family is it’s leader. You then have a wonderful relationship with your pet. Give short daily lessons and do not make them longer than ten minutes to start and as the pup learns to enjoy these times, you can increase the lessons to twenty minutes.
All lessons require the pup to be on a leash, so that you can give a slight tug to make the pup respond, if it doesn’t do it on its own Use the same commands and use a gentle tone, rewarding your pup with a treat, praise and affection. Once the lessons are learn’t discontinue the treats and just give praise and affection. Remember a pup does not understand speech. It learns from the tone of your voice and your body language. Sometime it helps to get on a lower level, by kneeling, so that your height does not intimidate your pup, while it is learning.
There are many excellent dog and puppy training online programs and dog obedience training. Training your pooch will make for a happy relationship for many years to come.
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