What do I do wrong?

[Leon]

I have got a six months old pup and I have been training since the beginning. I am training with snacks. When I have a cookie in my hands and give the "sit" commando Milo does it perfectly. When I dont have something to eat and say "sit" he just looks at me and does nothing. This started when he was 5 months old.

When I raise my voice he still does nothing and sometime he tries to walk away after this. When he tries this I grab his head (gently) with two hands and I force him to look me in the eyes. I always win the looking battle, but he just wont sit if I don't have a cookie in my hand. Is this dominance or is this is the (puberty)age? What can I do to make him listen without having to feed him... :(

[PooPooPie]

Hmm, grabbing his head and doing a dominance stare is probably freaking him out. When you say you have been training is this with the help of an obedience class, or just you? If the training is just you and him, get him in a class with the guidance of a professional.

FYI - my sister begged me to name my guy Milo ... ;)

[Leon]

I am going to class from the day he turned 12 weeks, so that is fine. The strange thing is that he listens perfect during the class, butt when we are home he just doesn't do it...

Did your sister succeed with her beggings? :)

[Judi W]

Training should always involve a leash and collar even if it is in the living room. Use your leash and collar to guide the dog, not just food as a lure. The lure is fine for a 12 week old, but this dog is not a baby puppy anymore although it is still a youngster. At this point the treat should be a reward and an intermittent one at that, not a lure. If you have the leash and are close to the dog, it cannot just walk off.

[poohbearsmom]

PLEASE !!!! Do not FORCE a puppy to do anything... Learning should be a FUN, POSITIVE, and CONSISTANT process for a puppy.

If he is not sitting when you do not have a treat, then he has NOT learned what is expected of him.... or ~ he has YOU trained...;)

It sounds to me like your pup is not leashed while you are working on his obedience.. with a leash, you have a greater degree of controlling the situation, and you can use it to GUIDE Milo to the proper action.. NOT FORCE.


Direct eye contact is a way of displaying dominance, and is actually a threatening signal to dogs... Again... please do not FORCE a puppy to give you eye contact.. make it FUN!!!!!!
Your pup is quickly approaching 7 mos of age ~ this is a time when puppies go through a second "fear period", in which situations/reactions, and recovery from them are imprinted for life. Forcing your pup to give you eye contact by grabbing his head and staring him down will more than likely do nothing more than make your puppy fearful of you. Is that what you're looking for in a companion dog? (or any dog for that matter)...

What does your obedience instructor say about the issues you're having with Milo, and his inconsistant behavior?

Inconsistancy in behavior is brought about through inconsistancy in training.

Regards,
Elisabeth

[Leon]

but how can I get it in his mind that he has to sit. He cannot walk away with a lure, but I cannot force him to sit down (offcourse i can, but thats obviously not the way...)
Is this dominance?

I didnt know that at the age of 7 months they start experiancing everything again, is this for all dogs?

My obedience instructor says that just have to continue with the cookie but I think that this is wrong, because I have read other threads here and they say that he should be able to do it without anything by now...

You must all know that this is the only problem that I have with the guy and we love him to death...

[poohbearsmom]

It's not necessarily dominance that he's displaying, but rather a lack of "proofing" or generalizing the behavior... He knows "sit" in certain circumstances, but it is not generally applied to every situation.... does that make sense?

Do you possess a toy that is of high value to Milo? If so, perhaps you could use that as a reward for action well executed... and switch between food and toy....

Judi is correct that food should be an intermittant reward... As Milo performs tasks asked of him, give him food rewards at longer intervals... for instance, when you first give him the sit command, you give reward immediately.. as he becomes more responsive to your request, hold off on the reward just long enough for him to be successful with the command, and so on... (i.e. 3 seconds, 10 seconds, 20 seconds and so on.... then, change it up..) This is where a good instructor is really needed, so they can coach YOUR handling skills.

You only want to give JUST enough reward to accomplish the behavior requested.

Keep your homework short and sweet... puppies have VERY short attention spans... It's better to have 3 five minute sessions in a day, than one 15 minute session in which Milo loses interest... ALWAYS end on a good note...

Hope this helps...

Cheers,

Elisabeth

[cpalenchar]

hello... :)

I know very little, so I can't help much in actually telling you *what* to do, but I'll still chime in some things I have learned in my training.

1) definitely aim to make training FUN! I would take a step back-- because this dog must not understand what you want from it. SOOO... forget about corrections for a week. Get excited about training. Figure out a way to get the dog to sit-- probably without showing him a treat-- and definitely without luring him into position (except maybe once or twice to get him going...). And PRAISE like you have never praised before in your life. My dogs *favorite* time of the day is training time. She likes it better than her walks. I bet if you're doing forced eye-contact with your dog he can't think too highly of training time. So... take time to build the excitement again, I think this will help in everything you try to do from here on out. I believe dogs do better when they *want* to, over when they *have* to. Not to say there isn't room for corrections, but lay the foundations of *want* firmly first!!!

2) Seems like somehow the dog is waiting for the food lure. As you're going through step 1, and retraining the whole thing. Make sure you give the food as a reward and not as a lure. They say to get the best behavior you go 1) lure into position 2) reward every time 3) go to variable reward 4) start rewarding *only* the *best* examples of the behavior until you're back to step 2, then repeat (3, 4, 2, 3, 4, 2....).

3) also remember dogs are very situational. They always say the dog learns a behavior for a specific place. That is, they can sit perfect at home. But become a complete bonehead in the back yard. It's not because they're stupid or spiteful, it's just because dog generalize very poorly. It is the trainers responsibility to work the dog in a variety of locations, and each time build the behavior up appropriately. My guess is the dog was never allowed to do a "bad" sit at school-- so it only has one type of behavior ingrained for school-- but it has learned 3 or 4 behaviors for home, and some of them you don't like. I think the best way around this-- especially for a puppy is to reteach the whole thing from scratch with lots of excitement like I tried to describe in 1.

good luck...

chloe

[Leon]

Thank you both elizabeth and chloe, you have given me something to work at.

[cpalenchar]

phew--- that took me some searching.... :)

leon-- this is a link to a flyball site... I don't compete in the sport myself, but I think this site does a *really* good job explaining some of the fundemental training concepts (like the variable reward piece I was trying to explain-- it's explained quite well in Chapt 5). It's long-- but packed full of good info (in my opinion). http://www.flyballdogs.com/on_mark.html

-chloe

[Judi W]

Making the training fun shouldn't mean that a leash pop cannot be used when it is called for. After all, it is called "obedience" not "if you feel like it". There might always be something more intriging no matter how happy, excited and whatever wonderful treats you have. This is no longer a tiny pup. This dog is certainly old enough to absorb a leash pop combined with a "good dog" for compliance.

Again, however, do not start any training sessions without a lead and collar on the dog. Does your instructor compete? If her only training tool is presenting a cookie and hoping for compliance, I doubt it.

[cpalenchar]

judy... I agree "fun training" does not mean "no corrections". However, I think especially for novice handlers (definitely including myself) it can be hard to determine "when it is called for" as you say in your post. In this guy's specific situation what would you think *should* be cause for correction?

Do you specifically disagree with my saying Leon should take "a week" off from corrections? I'm thinking the pup is displaying some avoidance behaviors (walking away)-- and maybe needs time to ensure confidence and basics are there-- before moving to the correction phase? Do you disagree with this? (It also seems like the pup needs to go back and learn to do the behavior without a lure.... which also indicates he might not actually "get" what is going on... another reason why I would do a bit of "positive only" training.)

I'm just curious-- because that is how I would proceed if it was my own pup. Especially if I realized I'd been overcorrecting like Leon had been..... And I am interested in another point of view....

-chloe

-chloe

[Storm]

The reward concept is to be offered at different stages relevant to your training which considering the age of your dog and having started this way from an early age, you should be getting the results. This will spill over into a "proofing" phase or balance but your foundation must be clear and effective at all stages.

[Leon]

but I was wondering cant it be his age, he is reaching his puberty now, maybe he doesnt listen to test me or something?
I am just saying something is this rediculous?:(

[Storm]

Firstly the dog can be lured into a position then the dog will be required to do the action in anticipation of the reward, irrespective of where it pops out from. Positions can be reinfoced by food for instance but a balance must be reached at the relevant stage relevant to the dog where a little persuasion may be required and reinforced with a positive, so although reinforced with compulsion the correct behavior is followed by reinforcing with a "positive" method.