When you first bring your puppy home,
is this the most adorable thing they'll follow you just about anywhere.
Everywhere you go in your home, they're right there with you.
Everything you say, they'll check in with you. Over time though,
puppies will get more confident and comfortable in their environment and if
you're a first time puppy owner, there's no need to worry.
This is actually a pretty good thing that your puppy is getting more confident.
What you do need to keep in mind though as a puppy owners that this is a very
impressionable time for your puppy and you need to be giving them good
information. In today's video,
I'm going to give you five tips that puppy owners often overlook for maintaining
some of that attention,
for keeping some of that focus and listening skills from your puppy so that you
can keep them safe and maintain your sanity throughout their training process.
I'm Ken Steepe and welcome back to McCann Dogs.
Here in our training facility we've helped more than a hundred thousand dog
owners who are just like you to overcome the same dog training challenges that
you have. So if this is your first time on the channel,
make sure you hit that subscribe button so that I can help you to have a well
behaved four legged family member.
We often talk to puppy owners about the value of using a crate.
Now you know that a crate is a great way to keep a puppy safe when you aren't
able to supervise them.
It's also really important way to give them a consistent location that's just
their own,
whether they're eating in there or they're snoozing in there or chewing on their
own little bone, whatever.
But what's important about using a crate is having a plan for when your puppy
comes out of their crate using a crate in your puppy's
Training is also a really important way to instill some listening skills.
Having a plan for when your puppy comes out of their crate doesn't need to be
complicated. But boy, Oh boy, can it be impactful for your puppy.
Think about this. Every time your puppy comes out of their crate,
you're there to train them. You're there to entertain them, to engage with them.
So now, not only are you the bringer of food,
but you're also the bringer of fun.
Let's take a look at what that might look like for you.
So it's time to take your puppy out of their crate, you pop them out,
you immediately go and take them to potty. Now,
whether that's outside or to a grass mat or whatever,
what you were trying to avoid is them having an accident indoors.
This is especially important for those of you who are maybe struggling with,
are still working on potty training, but once they've done that,
you bring them back inside or you bring them to whatever location you're at and
you can do things like playing tug with them.
You can maybe do some short recalls in a hallway.
Maybe you can do some luring exercises with your puppy and not only are you
teaching them something,
you're really showing your puppy that every time they come out of their crate
and they pay attention to you, they engage with you, they work with you,
they play with you. It's a lot of fun.
Now if you're working on crate training specifically,
this is even more important because when your puppy comes out of their crate and
you're getting them physically active,
you're exercising their brain a little bit at the end of your training session.
When it's time to go back for your puppy to go back into their crate,
they're ready for that. They're a more relaxed mindset. Maybe they're tired,
they can't wait to go and lie down and rest up and recharge for the next play or
training session.
And keep in mind some really common times for puppies to have accidents is when
they first come out of their crate during or after a play session after eating.
And you need to take your puppy out before they go back into their crate.
So after you finished this short training session,
make sure you take your puppy back to have to go potty and then they can go back
into their kennel.
But for those of you who are struggling with potty training or crate training,
this is going to be the formula that moves you forward.
If you're the kind of person that considers yourself a good multitasker,
think about all the things that you've just checked off the list.
Potty training, crate training, play exercise, some skills training.
But more importantly, you've just set your puppy up to listen. They came out,
they came out of their crate, you went out, did their thing,
you brought them back in. They, they did a focus session with you.
You worked on something. They go back out to potty.
They go back into their kennel where they can shut their brain off a little bit,
but the entire time they're out of their crate,
you've taught them that paying attention to you will bring you something that's
really valuable.
This is the first way I want you to start thinking about how you're going to
take advantage of your puppy's time out of their crate and how you're going to
teach them that. Listening is a really, really great thing.
When you're a puppy owner,
you need to be ready to reward your puppy all of the time. Now,
we talked a little bit earlier about bringing your puppy out of their crate and
keeping them focused on you and making sure that they're successful and keeping
them engaged.
But I also want you to be really ready for some of those moments where your
puppy makes a great choice. The other thing that you can do,
and we've talked about this in a previous video,
I'll drop a link in the description below where you can use some of their
breakfast to start their day off with a training session.
And what's so great about doing something like that is that not only does your
puppy's food come from you,
but your puppy's food can now come through you if they offer a little bit of
effort and teaching your puppy those kinds of things that you know,
putting in a little bit of work gets them something great is a really important
skill or a mindset that I want you to establish for them.
Always being ready to reward your puppy may mean that you are pulling your
laundry out of the dryer and discovering that you've just laundered a pocket
full of tuna treats or something gross like that.
If you're a first time puppy owner, don't feel bad. We've all been there.
But what's really important is that you're ready to reward your puppy. You know,
maybe in different locations around your home,
you can put little tiny piles up at a location where you can get at them quickly
in your home so that if your puppy makes a great choice,
you're able to quickly reward them. You know?
The other thing I want you to keep in mind is that I know a lot of people are
using kibble for treats and kibble as a, you know,
something to reward your puppy with.
And I actually talked a little bit about that when using part of their breakfast
or, or one of their meals, but also have a variety of treats.
Maybe there's a couple of different flavors of treats that your puppy likes.
Maybe it's some of last night's dinner.
Maybe you cut up some cooked chicken or maybe some steak. I don't know,
whatever your puppy loves. But I mean I love pizza.
But if I knew I had to have pizza every single day,
I'm not going to work very hard to get it.
So to keep your puppy attentive at this point in their training and at this
level of understanding for them might mean that you need to switch your treats
up a little bit. Maybe you know,
if they or every third treat is a tiny piece of cheese that can be really
helpful for your puppy getting a little bit more motivated and wanting to pay a
little bit more attention cause maybe this time they get the jackpot.
The other thing I really want you to be aware of is that in between these
training sessions, so you've probably come out of their kennel,
maybe you've done some training or you've played with them or done something.
You're going to see these times when they make some great choices.
And for your puppy, maybe that is just sitting,
just they happen to sit when normally they would have jumped up or maybe they go
in, lie on their puppy bed, you know,
maybe you've got a dog bed out and they just go happen to lie on it.
Having treats available is so important for you to be able to yes.
Then step over and reward that puppy. You really want them,
because in this instance,
they might not even know exactly what they're being rewarded for,
but you're reinforcing some of the good stuff. You know,
you're capturing these moments when your puppy makes a great choice and you are
letting them know that that's exactly what you want.
You want them to be looking for more of these opportunities and by reinforcing
some of these great choices,
you're much more likely to get them to make those same choices. Again,
you may notice in some of our videos that the dogs are checking in with us.
They're literally looking at our face.
And a great example of this is a Labrador retriever that instructor Steve did a
video with something about at least respect. He just met that dog, you know,
a few minutes prior to starting the training video and the dog was already
checking in with him.
Now this has everything to do with how you reward your dog.
We from the very beginning will reward our puppies for looking at us.
We'll capture that moment that they look at us.
But what's really important is how we reward them.
When you're rewarding your puppy and they're in a stationary position,
like maybe a sit could be a stand,
doesn't matter what it is and you catch them looking at you, I want you to yes.
And then reward in a direct line from your face to theirs.
Make very clear that when your puppy is checking in with you,
especially early on that they'll get something great for that.
I talked a moment ago about rewarding your puppy for going to their bed.
Imagine how valuable your puppy will think you are if every time they're looking
at you or you catch them, you know, staring adoringly up at you, you, yes them,
and then reward in that direct line from your face to theirs. Now,
this doesn't just apply to how you're rewarding when your puppy is looking at
you. There's actually some positional things that you can do.
Some ways to reward your puppy to really reinforce that you are where the good
things come from that will make them be more attentive and will make them
listen.
You're trying to get your puppy to want to listen to you a little bit more than
create a rewards zone around your body that's really close for exercises like
response to name or you know, here, here,
here or whatever you might be working on.
I want you to be really clear about the puppy only getting a reward when they're
in nice and close. If I were standing up,
I might reward the puppy with my knuckles touching my shins.
Really getting them in nice and close.
There won't be any question about where that food reward is coming from and
maybe you've done this now maybe you can think of a time that you know your
puppy was pointed away from you and you're rewarded them for lying down or
whatever. The thing is.
I want you to be very clear about where that food or where that value is coming
from and even to guide your puppy,
turn them toward you before you get that reward in.
This is a really great way to work on exercises like handling.
It's a really great way to teach your puppy that taking their color is a really
valuable thing,
but it's also really great for getting that puppy to know that getting close to
you where you can easily take them up is a rewarding place to be.
One sure fire way to teach your puppy that you're not worth listening to is
allowing them to fail over and over again.
Whether it's calling your puppy to come over to you and they're not listening or
asking them to stop jumping up and it's not happening.
Being a great leader means sending your puppy up to be successful,
but also showing them how to be right if they aren't successful training through
those moments.
Let's hear from kale for a minute about how you can show your puppy that you're
worth listening to just by being a great leader for them.
Now let's talk specifics.
Let's talk about non-confrontational ways that you can teach your dog that
you're a good leader and to listen to you without you having to be a big meanie.
So first things first is say what you mean and mean when you say so when you ask
your dog to do a behavior and they deliberately ignore you,
it's really important that you follow through.
And it could be something as simple as asking your dog to sit.
So if you ask your dog to sit for example,
and they're too busy sniffing the floor or barking at you know, a distraction,
all you need to do is repeat, sit in the same, you know,
kind and neutral voice you did the first time and then follow through by helping
them to move into position. But often what happens is people will start to say,
sit, sit, sit.
And they'll get louder and angry with each time that they ask the dog until the
dog finally, you know, gets overwhelmed and learns to listen. Well,
I don't know about you,
but I don't want to have to scream at my dog in order for them to listen to me.
I want them to learn that if I ask them to do something,
they need to follow through.
So my follow-through needs to be really calm and collected so the dog's not
getting worried or stressed. They basically just learn.
If mom tells me something to do, I really need to listen.
Sometimes you'll want your puppy to just be a puppy and you don't want to worry
about what exercise you should be working on with them or what skill you should
be teaching or training.
And that's really important and it's actually an important part of the bonding
process and as well as the leadership process.
But there are some really common mistakes that people make during this time that
teaches their puppy that they don't have to listen as an invested puppy owner
and somebody who's looking to teach their puppy to listen and be attentive and
be motivated.
I want you to think about your puppy being in one of three modes at any given
time. They're either training, they're being entertained,
or they're resting in their crate.
Now any time that your puppy is out of their crate,
you want to be invested in either training them or entertaining them,
but that doesn't mean that your puppy can just wander around freely and you
know, sneak around the corner away from you.
You're really closely paying attention to what they're doing because you really
want them to learn that you are someone who's worth giving to and worth
listening to. Anytime your puppy is out of their crate,
I want you to be really attentive to them.
These are the times when your puppy can make the biggest mistakes when they can
sneak away and they can have an accident in the corner of the room,
or they can chew the TV remote or pick up a sock from the laundry or whatever.
If you're really focused in, you're either training, entertaining,
or they're resting in their crate,
it's going to set you up and set your puppy up to be more successful.
But it's also gonna really bring along that bonding process.
Something that we'll often do with our own puppies for that entertainment time
is I'll bring them out of their crate and maybe I'll sit down on the floor with
them and they can chew a bone while I hold it or they can,
I can pet them and work on some handling exercises.
Maybe I'm sitting down to watch TV.
I've got my puppy with their house line on and I can you know,
handle their feet and just reward them for that. I mean, you can,
you can start to integrate these short training sessions as well as like bonding
time into your daily routine. What I want you to really think about,
especially if you're struggling with attention and listening,
is what does your puppy find rewarding?
And I want them to think and feel that you are the most rewarding thing in their
world. Now,
if you're looking for some specific exercises to work on with your puppy,
make sure you check out that video right there.
It's our puppy training schedule by age.
And if you're looking for more personalized training that's specific to your
puppy and specific to your needs, and you'd like to train with us,
then make sure you check out our puppy essentials program that's listed in the
description below. On that note, I'm Ken. Happy training!