Have you ever talked to someone that doesn't speak your language?
We tend to say the word over and over again,
and then we know that's not working. So we say it's slower.
Like that's going to help. Or we say it louder.
Like that's going to help a person that doesn't understand the word.
I'm going to say the word Suwaru, Suwaru, Suwaru. So are are you sitting down?
Because that's what I asked you to do. Now, if you're Japanese,
maybe you understood that. I don't know if I got the translation, right?
But that's the point. I can say that word over and over again.
But if you don't understand it, you can't do it. And too often,
we say too much to our dogs when they don't really understand what they want in
today's video, I'm going to show you how to better communicate with your dog.
By saying less. You're actually going to see me, teach a dog,
sit without saying anything. I'm instructor Carol. This is Texas.
Welcome back to McCann Dogs. In
dog training. Less is more.
If I kept speaking Japanese in this video, you're going to tune me out.
You're gonna change that channel pretty darn quick. If,
and that's the worst case, but the best case is that when I say sit,
yes, good girl. Get it.
Out. My dogs.
Responding. First time I say a command. If I keep saying words over in the end,
even if she understands them, she may not tune me out, but you know what?
She's not going to respond the first time.
I'm going to have to say my commands over and over again all of the time.
Now that was all well and good, but you probably want to see a specific example.
What do I mean by this? So number one, I'm going to teach a dog.
Say they don't know, sit at all.
I could get a treat out and I could tell them, getting here.
Sit so.
Nice. Clear. And I'm going to reward break.
I could also just show them like this.
Good girl. What a good girl. And I could feed that.
I can praise that. I can talk to them. I can keep the attention.
Good pup way to go break. So I'm seeing it once out.
Thank you. And then I'm rewarding them. Now.
I also need my dog to understand they should hold that position.
And that's really the hard part. Easy to teach a dog to sit. We tell them,
sit we lure them we give them a treat.
Every dog in the world probably does that.
But having them hold when stuff's going on is much tougher.
See it. So now that my dog is sitting on command, they also need to hold that.
Even if something exciting was going to go on what a good girl and I'll
reward that one. Yes.
So I'm going to praise and reward that if she was to get up, stop.
Break. I'm just.
Placing her back. I don't want to pull out food again. She's going to learn, oh,
when I want a piece of food, I've got my owner trained. I just move.
All I'm doing is placing her back. I'm showing her what I want. Now,
are you guilty of this trap, Texas city, Texas, Texas, Texas.
Touch this. Most of us use our dog's name way too often.
So do you do that? Which case again?
There's all that noise that our dogs don't really understand.
Sit gently, place her back. I don't have to be harsh.
I don't have to get mad at her. I don't have to raise my voice.
I just need to be consistent. And she's going to understand, oh,
I guess I need to hold this. And when she's holding it, good things happen.
What are good pop? I can use my voice. Now, a lot of people say,
do we have to use food? You know what?
If you have great timing and you have that clear communication,
you don't need food. But for a lot of us,
why not use that food to build the value for the set? You can make up.
If our timing's not so good, what a good pop.
And even when exciting things are going to happen,
what a good pop the dogs learned. Hold that's it until we say.
Break, good girl.
Now the big mistake people make is that they don't show the dog.
What they're supposed to do when the dog makes mistake. Um,
they just repeat the command. So sit, sit, sit,
the dog's making repeated mistakes.
Then the person gets frustrated and they say sit.
And then they take action. But then people say to me,
my dog only responds when I say sit and I don't want to have to yell it.
Well you don't have to. You're just going to show them what you want.
Less is more. Sit, show them what you want.
Say it once. Not repeatedly and do it each time your dog gets up.
Think less. Isn't more, let's try a little experiment.
I'm not sure how this will go. Um, I'm going to work with Euchre. Now,
some of you have seen Euchre and you're going to say she knows sit.
This is a trick, but she knows sit sitting in control position at the side.
So I'm going to try not to say anything. Now think it's hard. Not to. It is.
Even for me not to say humans want to keep talking. We fill those empty spaces.
So I'm going to take some treats.
The only word you're going to hear me say is the word, okay?
To let her know she can get out of the set. So I've got a handful of treats.
Let me load up and let's see if I can have her.
Work. I guess it, yeah,
I'm going to feed her one. So she stays interested in me.
I'm just going to anchor my leash so she can't take off.
Let her snarfle up my hands.
I'm not going to lure.
So notice I'm not putting my hands up so that it doesn't look like I'm luring
her at all.
I'm not telling her anything.
And I could absolutely lure her and give her that information.
But let's see if she can just figure this out.
Yeah.
Rewarding her
order again.
Now let's see if she offers that behavior again.
She's a pretty smart pup. She said, I know how I got rewarded.
So what if we make it tougher?
That's going to let her know that. Yes. Good. Yes,
yes, yes,
yes. Good girl. Yeah,
yeah, yeah. What a smart girl. You are
sure. There must be one down there.
Which her chicken. It not loaded down near girly.
Yeah.
Yeah. You're so smart.
You're so smart. Okay. Go get those.
So I never said the word sit. Once I get,
add that once she understands the behavior,
but she figured out just by rewarding and I didn't use the word. Yes.
I said it was going to be hard not to say anything. So yes,
pinpointed when she made a good choice,
but only that it wasn't praising her completely.
But I was letting her know that specifically. That was a great choice.
Not to move from that position.
She learned her job was to sit and hold that sit. Even when I was throwing food,
I want to use another example. And this one,
I'm going to talk about both verbal and nonverbal communication,
response to name, calling our dogs to us.
So have you fallen in the trap of saying spot, spot,
spot while your dogs across the yard?
And you're saying that name multiple times again, just like that. Sit.
I want to say my command once. And if my dog doesn't respond,
I'm going to show them how to respond to what that look like in a second.
I'm going to let Thorpe get a little distracted. Now he's deaf.
So he wouldn't respond on his name, but I'm going to have him pointing away.
So I'm going to show you a say, assume I'm across the yard. Um,
Thorpe's distracted here.
I would walk across the yard after saying that name. So I'm going to come here,
buddy. Let me get these out first.
Okay. So I said Thorpe. There was no response.
I'm going to walk across that yard. Thorpe. Little touch, touch. Yay.
Good boy. Yeah. You leave that food. Yes. Good boy. So I'm praising him.
I'm not going to reward it with food or toy because he didn't respond the first
time. Now if he moved and I said Thorpe, and he did! Way to Go, oh,
you're brilliant. Doesn't have to be food. I can have a tub. I can play. Um,
I could absolutely rewarding with some food. So let your dogs know.
They're wonderful when they respond.
If they don't respond on that one clear name,
walking in there. Name, touch,
or couple of touches like I had to do till they respond and then let them know
clear communication. That was the right response.
So that's the start of that response to me and the actual turn to look at me.
Let's talk about the middle of that exercise. My dog's way across the yard.
I called the name and they turn.
So do you have trouble not seeing something when you're training your dog,
you're going to shine here because that's a point where your voice is absolutely
important. My dog turns, especially those young dogs.
They're so easily distracted. So I'm going to yay way to go. I'm over here,
buddy. You're brilliant.
I don't want to keep repeating that name cause I'm going to water it down again.
They're going to learn. They don't need to respond on one, but cheer them on in.
Now let's talk about the end of that exercise.
You've called your dog become booting across the yard.
Do you find that your dog hesitates to come right in or do you notice
some body language? You know,
picture one of those relatives that doesn't like hugging you go to hug and
they're, you know, in their, their arms are tucked tight.
They don't want that hug.
Have you ever observed your dog's body language as they come in?
If you're bending over them now dogs don't like it. When we get into their face,
let's see what Thorpe does. We have a pretty strong relationship.
He's pretty focused on me, but if I reach down,
you can see. So he saw a couple of things there.
He looked away from me because dogs, have you ever seen them greet.
They come in and they don't look at each other. They turn their head to,
he did exactly that. I come in. He turns his head away.
The other thing on the first one, if you saw he licked,
that's a sign of a little bit of stress.
He was you I'm uncomfortable because dogs don't do that too.
One of the reasons we don't want to hug dogs. If you have a lab,
you can probably ignore that.
Cause they love everybody in their face for the most part. But most dogs do not.
So if my dogs coming in on that response to name and I go to
reach down, most dogs, thank you,
buddy will turn away or even back away from us.
And they're going to over and over time, say, coming to you is no longer fun.
So my verbal body language, um,
or my non-verbal should be to be tall and encourage my dog and close.
Then I could bend down and you can see Thorpe is very comfortable with me,
not in his face and not grabbing, especially those little dogs.
When we reach down and grab for them,
it can be so darn intimidating.
So they tend to stay way away from us, not come right in.
I can also use my body language and my verbal, um, to help my dog.
So if your a dog boots across the yard,
some of those young dogs are going to be wild after that stimulating run.
So by standing tall, they're less likely to jump or go crazy.
And now want a puppy burn around again.
I could use my clear sit to help my young dog coming in.
So they don't take out my knees or just keep on running now with training.
I provided you the tactics, but with all dog training,
cause each dog is a little different observation is really important.
Like I said, watching your dog's body language, not just on that response to me,
but all of them. Now,
if you'd like some additional help with your training and some feedback on what
you're doing, we've got a supported online program.
So if you're interested in check out the online Life Skills program,
the links in the description below,
I've been talking about good communication with your dog,
but really communication is part of good leadership with your dog.
So if you want to see more on that click this card right here on that note,
I'm Carol. This is Thorpe Happy Training.