The 10 Commandments of Dog Training
People who are successful at training understand and follow the 10 rules for training, (a.k.a. the 10 Dog Training Commandments)
I’m regularly reminding people that to be successful they need to start with the first rule of training.
“To teach or change a behavior we must remove the dog’s ability to continue to practice or rehearse the wrong behavior while we work to teach a new behavior.” It’s a simple rule, but it’s not always easy which is why there is a need to follow rule number 2.
The second rule of training is “Supervision and management are required to teach a dog what we want them to do, and to prevent unwanted behavior.”
The rules are especially important when we want to change a behavior like jumping up, pulling on leash, chewing, digging, getting in the trash, and especially housetraining.
People are often surprised when I tell them that when I brought my 8-week-old puppy (Gromit) home that he has only had one pee accident in the house. (He is now 3-years old) Even that wasn’t his fault. I didn’t follow my own rules or housetraining guidelines. At 9-weeks of age I had let him fall asleep in front of the fireplace after playing and did not take him out to the designated area before letting him nap. So naturally he woke up after about 20-minutes napping and peed in front of the door we used to go to the yard. The only time he was in a crate was when we were in the car until he grew to a size he could use a crash-rated harness in place of a crate.