House Training Dogs

All dogs need to be house trained, if they are to be successful  as domestic pets. There is no fun in having an animal in your house who is pooing and peeing everywhere.  There's not much disputing that.

House training dogs is usually necessary if you buy a puppy, but sometimes an adult dog who has not been accustomed to life in a home will need toilet training, or maybe a rescue dog who has had abuse and is fearful and confused.

The thing to remember is that dogs are naturally clean animals who rarely soil their own bed or nest.  It is their instinct to toilet away from the area where they eat or sleep.  So all you need to do is to reinforce this natural instinct and make sure they learn quickly that you want them to go outside.

As with all dog training, you must accentuate the positive and ignore the negative as much as possible.  The old  idea of scolding the dog and rubbing the poor mutt's nose in it is just barbaric and cruel.  And who wants a dog with a nose covered in his own excrement?  That is just disgusting for both of you!

The fundamental thing you must be with dog house training is attentive.  You need to read the dog's body language.  If the pup is active and not sleeping or resting, chances are that he or she might need to go, and soon!  Particularly if they have just eaten or had a drink.  The opportunity to go outside should be given at these times always.  Initially, before the dog knows what pleases you, you should escort the dog outside, maybe keep him on the leash, and give fulsome praise and perhaps food treats if and when they do one of their duties outside. The dog will soon learn that doing his business outside is really pleasing to you, and also very beneficial to him, as he gets treats and fusses.

Punishment, especially for something the hound has no idea was wrong, has no place in modern dog training techniques.  Still, some of us believe that if a dog  is  caught in the act of peeing or pooping indoors, he should be firmly told “no” and then immediately taken outside.  This helps to get the message across that you don't want them to go indoors, and the al fresco toileting is much preferred.

If you want your dog to understand human language, and have a command they understand for toileting, then it is common to say 'be clean' or 'go toilet' when you want to encourage them to go.  Take care it is a phrase you can handle using for the rest of the dog's life though, and in public too.

At the time when the dog is inside on his own,  it is usual to use newspaper down on the floor to prevent soiling.  The dog gets the idea that, failing going outside, the newspaper is a relatively good place to do his business. Gradually, as the dog is getting the idea, you can reduce the amount of newspaper and move it nearer to the door, so the dog can understand even more that the door – and more particularly, outside the door,  is where he should really go. 

There are often moments of frustration, but as long as you are patient, most dogs become house trained within a few weeks.

Dog Training - Should we Use Words or Hand Signals?

Whilst human beings are fundamentally verbal creatures who perhaps conveniently forget that we are animals at heart, the evolution of dogs has not enabled them to discover the joys of language in quite the same way.  People often speak to dogs as if they are children learning to speak, and bafflingly expect them to comprehend.  The fact is that most dogs understand body language much more readily than they do the spoken word.

The old-fashioned methods of training dogs involved a great deal of physical coercion.  Pushing down on the dog's hindquarters in order to make them sit, pulling them around, using choke chains, shouting at the dog if he displeases, that sort of thing.  This did not encourage a respectful, warm and loving relationship between owner and dog.  It was more likely to engender fear in the dog, who was confused as to why the owner behaved in this way.  Some may argue that it worked in some cases, but at what cost to the relationship between man (or woman) and dog?

Modern dog training methods stress the attitude of the dog in relation to his position in a dog pack.  If packs of wild wolves or dogs are observed, there is a great deal of body language being exhibited and the animals are reading physical signals from each other regarding dominance, submission, pack bonding, appeasement etc.  What is also relevant is the amount of physical contact and love between the dogs in a pack.  Dog training is all very well, by all means civilise the dog, show him the rules and what you expect of him, but show him love and affection too in an appropriate way.  A rub behind the ears, or a tickle under the chin, just being with your dog and casually stroking him are all ways of showing your love and encouraging the bond between you.

The fact is that dogs can understand a few words of human language, but these words have to be contextualised and given relevance by the use of body language and hand signals, along with positive reinforcement in the form (usually) of food rewards.  Basically, you begin by asking the dog to perform the action you want via hand signals accompanied by a treat.  For a sit, you might have a food treat in your hand as you tilt your hand up and back in front of the dog's nose.  This makes him raise his head and tilt it backward, hopefully this makes him tilt his body back and end up in a sitting position.  He gets the treat, he realises what he did right.  A bit more of this and you start using the word "sit" whilst he does it. Eventually the hand signal becomes relatively redundant, and the dog responds to the word sit.  He has learned in a way what sit means.  However, you will always find that the hand signal works as well as the word.  The two together is ideal.  It seems that the dog can forget the words much more readily than he forgets that all-important hand signal.

So for most dogs hand signals are much more important than words in dog training.  Exceptions to this may be blind or deaf dogs.  Deaf dogs cannot understand words at all so they must be trained exclusively by hand signals.  Blind dogs have to be trained using words and food treats.

Dog training Tips and Tricks

There are many dogs who need training because they specialize in either taking care of humans with disabilities or assisting with law enforcement activities.  However, dog training is also used as a popular method of training house pets to communicate with their owners, other dogs and members of the household. Dog training involves lessons on how to behave in certain situations; it also teaches the animal to respond to specific commands and actions.

Dog training is rooted in communication as the handler is communicating to the dog behaviors that are desirable or undesirable in specific situations - this is, of course, from the human perspective.  The dog can in turn signal that he is unsure, nervous, happy, sick or excited: the dog's emotional state plays a great part in whether he adheres to the training because if the animal is exhausted or distracted he will not learn the method properly.

Operant conditioning involves using consequences to modify different forms of behaviour: the main tools of operant conditioning are negative and positive reinforcement. Training usually involves a system of punishments and rewards and operant conditioning further explains these four types of consequences: negative reinforcement, positive reinforcement, negative punishment and positive punishment.

Positive reinforcement occurs when a behavior is followed by an action that is seen as pleasant and increases the frequency of the good behavior.  The pleasant action in dog training consists of using praise and positive actions to reward the dog instead of punishment or correctional actions.  This can be done with treats, toys, or verbal praise.  The main tip here is to to determine what motivates the animal and use the motivator as a reward system.

In positive reinforcement training it is crucial to reward the dog immediately. The method works by prompting the dog to perform certain simple actions such as sit, stand, stay or others. If you cue the dog to sit and he responds promptly give him the treat so he knows he is being rewarded for this behavior: make sure to choose something that the dog gets pleasure from.

The two key issues in positive reinforcement are timing and consistency. so ensure that the dog is rewarded immediately each time he obeys the cue and always use the same cue words.

Negative reinforcement works in the opposite way, this method utilizes forms of punishment each time the animal displays undesirable or unwanted behaviour. This option sees the use of tools such as choke collars or chemical compounds such as bitter apple and lemon juice.  Recently the crate training method has also been classified as negative reinforcement - this method encloses the animal in a small crate when the owner is unavailable so the dog learns to control his urges for going to the bathroom in the crate, as dogs do not like to go to the bathroom in the same place. Other people might swat the animal on the buttocks or nose as means of negative reinforcement, this issue is very controversial and in some cases can move from negative reinforcement to abuse.  There is a very thin line and physical punishment is rarely necessary and does not foster a good relationship between owner and dog.  Owners must be very careful indeed if choosing this method.

Specially Trained Dogs

Dog training teaches a dog how to perform certain actions.  It is used by owners who want to communicate better with their pets.  Specially trained dogs are often used in particular  situations involving law enforcement, hunting, search and rescue and also to aid persons with disabilities.

Assistance dogs are trained to help people with disabilities.  Through the help of a handler or the specific organization, these dogs can be further classified into three general types: guide dogs, service dogs and hearing dogs.

Guide Dogs

Guide Dogs date as far back as World War One when a school in Germany trained German shepherds to assist veterans who were blinded from the war; this is when the Guide Dog program for dog training was developed.  It was later adopted and advanced in the United States by a woman named Dorothy Harrison Eustis, a wealthy Philadelphian. The first known case of an individual using these dogs, now known as the ‘seeing eye dog’, was in 1928 when a man known as Morris Frank, who had lost the use of his eyes in two separate accidents, used specially trained dogs.  Although the method began with German Shepherds, trainers began to recognize other breeds that could also be used and today the most popular type of dogs used as guides are Labradors, Golden Retrievers and German Shepherds.

The dogs are trained to navigate around different obstacles; however they are partially color blind and cannot interpret street signs. The guide dog and its owner act as a team: the owner does the directing based on the skills acquired though necessary mobility training.  The dog training is done by both the dog and the owner so they can interpret each other’s signals.  There is usually a lot of trust needed in this relationship as they both need to depend on each other for their own safety.

Hearing Dogs

These are specially trained dogs that assist individuals who are hearing impaired.  The dogs that qualify for this position have to be tested for sound reactivity and proper temperament. The idea behind hearing dogs originated in 1979 at an international conference for vets and in February 1982 the first training center was launched.

Hearing dogs are usually rescue dogs, cross-breeds and mongrels and they vary from medium-large to small.  They have very intensive training that teaches them how to respond to certain sounds.  The training period last for 10 months and dogs are introduced to their prospective owners in the early stages of training,  After a while they spend a short period of time with the owner in a specially designed flat at the training center. When the dog training program is complete the dogs are efficient in the ‘touch and tell’ routine where they can identify sounds  and where they are coming from. They are also able to seek out and touch their owner and show him where the sound has come from.

The hearing dog has a specific reaction to the sound of a fire alarm: in this case the dog alerts its owner by touch, then lies down flat so the owner can differentiate between the fire alarm sounds and other sounds. Hearing dogs can be identified by their yellow coat which has ‘hearing dog’ displayed clearly on it to distinguish them from other specially trained dogs.