For a more detailed description see below and you can watch the lesson 3 video for a refresher.

Just because we can physically influence what our puppies are doing doesn’t mean we should. Puppies don’t have wings and therefore shouldn’t fly…. Or be picked up.

Be careful with little dogs who can easily be picked up as they are often very wriggly, and therefore easily dropped and injured.

Be ready – have a rope toy & trail mix all the time.

Random reinforcement for life – payment for working – not rewards for being “good”.

There are a couple of other short YouTube video links to view if you have time.

BBC dogs at play - https://fb.watch/45KYPCBbme/

Potty Bells – ring a bell to go out

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Drop the No and ah ah and use your list of words

“Don’t label it until you love it”

Remember to only practice each new behaviour 3 to 4 times each training session

Mat/bed training - Stand close to the puppy’s bed and lure them towards their bed, to start with they might only get their front feet on to the bed mark and reinforce. You can then teach “off” by throwing a piece of food onto the floor, say “Off” as they move towards the food mark; their reinforcement is the food on the floor. 

Step two is reinforcing an automatic sit or down by waiting for them to offer a sit or down. We are chaining a number of behaviours so don’t ask for the sit or down wait and if they offer it mark and reinforce.

Release Cue - Introduce a release cue such as “Free”, Break”, “Release”. Teach the release cue by throwing a piece of food onto the floor. Say your release word, as the puppy moves towards the food mark they will be reinforced from the food on the floor. 

This can also be used for building duration in Sit & Down. 

Lie down - Ask the puppy to sit then lure them by keeping the food close to their nose and slowly moving the food down past their chest and placing it between their front paws (think nose to toes, some puppies may need toes to hips for example dachshunds). As the puppy’s chest goes down, mark and reinforce. 

Mark for approximations ie if their chest and bottom stays down. If the bottom pops up it means you were too fast with the luring. It’s important to reset each time so the puppy knows there is a start and a finish to the behaviour. 

Rapid Fire Feed - A Rapid Fire Feed is when you give the puppy a larger than normal amount of reinforcement, a small handful of food, given one piece at a time for getting a complex behaviour right. This heightens the learning experience and makes it more likely for the puppy to want to succeed again.

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Open your mouth

‍Encourage the puppy to take an item of low value, like a plastic lid, ball, or rope toy, offer them a new “exchange” item (food) of higher value, say the “open your mouth word” and trade the old item for the higher value item (food). As the item falls from their mouth mark and reinforce them by giving the “exchange” piece of food. 

LET THE ITEM FALL ON THE FLOOR & DON”T PICK IT UP - you are building trust.

Begin by offering the higher value item first then build up to asking (taking) first and mark and reinforce second.

Leave it

‍Using an object of little interest to your puppy, place the object in front of them and ask them to “leave it” (cover it with your hand if you must). As soon as they move their attention away from the object mark and reinforce. Increase the value of the object only when your puppy reliably leaves the object when requested. Go through the levels from 1. On your knee, 2. On the floor, 3. Being dropped = (prey drive)

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Recall

Using a loud happy voice, call your puppy’s name, wait for the “check in” then say your recall word such as “Come” or “Here”, move away from your puppy, hand extended with food. Mark and reinforce with praise and food when they move towards you. Use your Recall word “come” whenever the puppy is moving towards you (this reinforces the request)

Wait for their check in - don’t make this verbal cue become WHITE NOISE. Never use your recall word to call your puppy to punish them. You will poison the word.

Introduce a release cue such as “Free”, Break”, “Release”. Teach the release cue by throwing a piece of food onto the floor. Say your release word, as the puppy moves towards the food mark they will be reinforced from the food on the floor.

We will talk more about the four D’s - Distraction, Duration, Distance and Difficulty.

An "employed" puppy that is mentally stimulated, made to feel part of the family, played with, and exercised appropriately is a puppy that you will enjoy spending time with and is less likely to display undesirable behaviours.

Give your puppy plenty to do so that they don’t go looking for their own entertainment. The main reason for chewing, digging and destructive behaviours is boredom. Checkout this YouTube channel for more tips.

Dogs dig for many reasons.

• its self-rewarding – they enjoy it
• it’s an instinct
• to get cool
• to get warm
• to look for running water
• to look for bugs, etc.

Ensure your puppy can lay somewhere cool, lay somewhere warm, their water is always fresh, and they have more than one water bowl.

Create a safe and rewarding area for digging. Use a half shell filled with sand and bury hard chews and toys in the sand. Use deer antlers or kangaroo tendons so that your created digging area is more rewarding than any other area. Dog proof other areas that they have used for digging before.