POSITIVE PUPPY TRAINING WORKS

By Joel Walton

How to manage, relate to, and educate your puppy. Emphasizes puppy needs and feelings, and how to show and teach them to be good companions, using gentle, puppy-friendly methods. Includes Joel's management, relationship and education system (MRE); his Simply Observe and Reward (SOAR); Simply Teach and Reward (STAR), which teaches basic commands; crate training; housetraining; dealing with play biting; teaching what to chew; solving normal puppy problems; socializing/greeting people and other dogs, more. VERY gentle, positive training methods.

• Language: English
• Publisher: David & James Publishers
• Release date: Jan 1, 2002
• ISBN: 9781617810589

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

MANAGEMENT, RELATIONSHIP, AND

EDUCATION SYSTEM (MRE)

MANAGEMENT

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Puppies do normal puppy things. Puppies act like puppies! Normal puppy behaviors (barking, peeing, pooping, puppy biting, chewing, jumping up and others) performed at the wrong time or in the wrong place often cause us concern.

The easy and immediate way of handling inappropriate (from our point of view) behaviors is management. If the puppy is barking, eliminate the reason for the barking, or physically relocate the puppy so that the barking does not disturb anyone. If the puppy pees on the carpet, use a doggy den and make sure you take the puppy outside to pee at the appropriate times. If the puppy is play biting, give the puppy a safe object to carry in her mouth or confine her. If the puppy is chewing your shoe, give the puppy a safe chew object. If the puppy is jumping up, give the puppy something else to do, or confine her.

You must have your management system in place the day your puppy comes home. Some management will be necessary until your puppy learns which behaviors are going to be rewarded and which behaviors will not be rewarded. Some management may be necessary for the remainder of your puppy’s life. For as long as you share your life together, you will use a buckle collar and a leash to keep your puppy safe when walking along the sidewalk, or in rural areas with domestic and wild animals.

flo  Advantages of Management

1. It is so easy!

2. When your puppy is set up to do the right thing, she trains herself!

3. It puts an immediate end to the problem.

Relationship

Dogs are group animals and are hardwired (genetically programmed) to live with others. They start out wanting to fit in. Humans feel the same way. Maybe that’s why humans and dogs often have such a great relationship. When the relationship is not working as well as we want it to, the easiest way to improve the relationship is to change what we are doing. You and your puppy will have a great relationship if you reinforce what you like and prevent the puppy from doing things you don’t like. Be a positive human and a humane Mom or Dad for your puppy. You are blessed with a much larger brain than your puppy. Use your large brain to help your puppy and yourself.

Every time she runs up to you, when off leash, give your puppy a treat and then you let her go play. Guess what? If you keep doing that, you will have a puppy that will learn to check in with you whenever she is off lead and playing with other puppies and people. Why? Because you are always rewarding, and she gets to continue to do other rewarding things after she checks in for the treat.

Don’t worry about being too permissive. You won’t be too permissive. Instead, you will keep your puppy out of trouble while you educate her. Don’t let your puppy play with small children until she has learned not to jump up. Keep her on a leash and make sure it is rewarding for her to sit near small children. She will develop a good relationship with you and with small children.

To ensure a great relationship with your puppy, don’t do bad things to your puppy when she does something you consider wrong. If you let your puppy jump up on a visitor, it’s your fault. Don’t yell at your puppy. Use better management the next time. Whenever you do something bad to your puppy (cause physical discomfort or pain), she learns that you are not that great to be around. She may or may not learn that her behavior is causing the pain. She may just learn that you have a bad temper and will hurt her. This is not the formula for a healthy relationship. Manage your puppy to keep her safe and happy. If you make a management mistake, do not hurt your puppy. Recover from the situation as best you can and then make it a point to use better management and to train your puppy. That is the way to preserve and continue to build your relationship while you train your puppy to be a wonderful companion. If you’re using an appropriate management system and appropriate ways to educate, you get the relationship for free. If you don’t use reward training, then you will have to work on repairing the relationship. Doesn’t it make more sense to do it correctly the first time?

flo  Advantages of a Great Relationship

1. Why did you get a puppy, if you didn’t want a great relationship?

2. Praising a well behaved puppy dog makes you feel good!

3. It is nice to live with at least one living being that enjoys doing what you want.

Education

Your puppy is learning

Reviews for POSITIVE PUPPY TRAINING WORKS

[amanda47_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

very easy read, very pratical, however, also very simple