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Showing posts with the label positivereinforcement

8 Easy Ways to Train Your Puppy to Be Obedient in Short Time

8 Easy Ways to Train Your Puppy to Be Obedient in Short Time My neighbor's kid has a dog that sits at the kitchen door and waits every single time. Doesn't beg, doesn't whine, doesn't lean on your leg. Just sits, with a tennis ball at his feet, until somebody opens the door. I asked her how long that took. She said it started with him being a bad dog. I got the story later over a beer, and the short version is that it took about eight months of the boring kind of work, not the showy kind. Nobody filmed any of it. Nobody posted a thirty-second video of the dog going from wild to perfect. It was just a kid in a garage with a bag of treats and a dog who did not care about the bag of treats. That story has been sitting in my head for a month, because it's the honest version of a title like this one, and the honest version is more useful than the promise. Before we get into it, I should say what "short time" actually means here, because I think it gets misunder...

One Training Mistake That's Ruining Your Dog's Progress

The One Training Mistake That's Ruining Your Dog's Progress You know that moment when you're practicing "sit" for the tenth time in a row, and your dog just looks at you like you've completely lost your mind? Yeah. That's not your dog being stubborn. That's your dog telling you something important. You're just not listening. I learned this the hard way with my golden retriever, Cooper. He was eight months old, full of energy, and absolutely brilliant at ignoring me during training sessions. I'd bought all the right books. I'd watched every YouTube video on positive reinforcement. I had treats in my pocket at all times like some kind of deranged snack dealer. And still, nothing worked the way it was supposed to. Here's the thing about dog training that most people don't realize. It's not about repetition. It's not about getting your dog to perform a behavior fifty times in a row until it sticks. It's about timing. Picture...