Five free tips for clicker training dogs
Clicker training is a fairly new approach to training dogs. It’s used to train show dogs to do special tricks, but it can also be used to train your family Labrador retriever to sit or lie down. Clicker training works on the assumption that dogs want to learn to do what their humans want.
Dogs like to learn new things. They want to be included in family activities. It’s hard for them to succeed because we have trouble communicating what we want from them. The clicker tells the dog, “What you did THEN was great!” and rewards the behavior. The dog says, “Hey that was fun! What did I do?” and tries to get the human to repeat the click and reward behavior. It’s almost as if the dog and trainer train each other.
With clicker training, you bring up dogs with all positive reinforcement. A dog who has had clicker training is happy and confident. Here are five tips for clicker training your dog.
1. Get everybody, including the kids, involved in the training. Physical strength isn’t a requirement, because you don’t use a leash. All you have to have are clicker, treats, and time. You’ll want to supervise little ones, especially with big dogs, but the clicker training quickly have the whole family using the same words and rewards — making it much easier for the dog to learn.
2. When you’re starting out, click anything that approaches what you want. The dog learns the behavior first and then the sound you make when you’re asking for the behavior. If the lesson is “sit,” you’ll click and reward any time the dog moves toward a sitting position. As time goes by, you’ll get pickier with your clicks, and the dog will keep playing the game for rewards.
3. Play clicker training with your dog every day, even if it’s just a few minutes. Pick a behavior to concentrate on, and click and reward anything that approaches that behavior. We get used to thinking dogs understand us, even though they don’t. The word “sit” means nothing to them until we teach them to associate it with “rump on floor.”
4. Once the dog understands that “butt on floor” means click and treat and associates that behavior with the sound “sit,” then you can refine the behavior. You can use the clicker to distinguish between a “sit” that gets a reward and a “sit” that just gets a “try again.” The progression moves naturally, and eventually you can put the clicker away until the next time you want to teach something.
5. Make the clicker training a time for fun for you and the dog. Dogs are simple-hearted creatures who really enjoy being with their people and interacting with them. If you’ve got a cheery voice and a pleasant manner with them, they will return your joy multifold and try to do anything that you want them to.
Clicker training is a great way to raise a dog to expect good things from people. If your dog is confident and happy, he will love to learn to do what you want to teach.
About the Author
After living with dogs most of her life, JV Bear has seen many forms of dog training come and go, but clicker training has produced the best results with the least effort and the happiest and best-behaved dogs of all. For more information about clicker training, see her blog at Dog Clicker Training Review.
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