Waching daily Jul 4 2017

- Hey it's Tenille here from Dog Matters

and today I'm gonna answer a question that

I get all the time

and that's which command should I use.

So this will happen when we're talking

about teaching any behavior

but I'm gonna use the example today

of the down command.

So getting a dog to lay down on command.

And often when I bring that up

a lot of people will say what word should I use.

Should I use drop or down or what?

And my answer frequently is you can use

the word pancakes if you like

because your dog doesn't come preprogrammed

knowing words when it's born.

We've got to teach them what each word means,

and we do this through a pattern

of making sure that we say the word,

and then make the behavior happen after the word.

And that's really important if you want your dog

to know the actual meaning of the sound

of the word rather than

your body language that's going around it.

And it's also really important to do it

in that pattern to avoid repeating the command.

So what we do is we teach the dog the behavior,

so the action of the down command,

the way we want it to look before we start

saying down or drop or any command words at all.

So to illustrate that it doesn't really matter

what word you use exactly I'm gonna show you that

Envy can do it with two different words.

She can do it in English, and be down.

Good girl.

Hey, here.

Good.

Or she can do it in German.

Envy, platz, good.

You can tell that her German command is

more of her formal command.

You may have noticed that she went backwards

into down with the German command

and when I said it in English,

she was a lot more casual and relaxed about it.

And that's the way I've taught it.

But if you want to, you can teach any word

for any behavior that you would like.

So making sure so that the dog knows how

to perform the behavior first than

pairing the word that you want with it.

So if it was a dog that had never

done the down before,

I would spend some time shaping it how I want

by using food lures and gentle leash pressure

and guidance and then when I have it looking

exactly how I want,

I am gonna start saying the word

just before I make it happen.

And I'm gonna make sure that I make it happen

after the first command so that I don't end

up repeating myself many times.

Another example of dogs not knowing

words automatically is that

when you get a new dog or a new puppy,

especially new puppies,

that don't know any words yet, than they don't

automatically know the word no.

So a lot of people will say to me

"I tried saying no to stop them

"from doing such and such a behavior

"and they just won't listen"

but that wouldn't be fair to expect the pup

to understand what the word no means

without prior experience to that

and showing them what you want the word no

to mean and the same goes for any command.

So it's all about making sure that you're clear

with your dogs with what

you want the word to mean

no matter what that word is.

Another thing to take into account is

your hand signals and your body language.

Your dog will always look at that first

before they listen to the word that you're using.

So if you've paired a hand signal

with a command, such as pointing down,

you have to watch that if you want your dog

to know the word, you're separating it.

So instead of saying down at the same time

as moving your hand, you say down

and then follow with the body language

part of the equation so that the dog can see

the pattern and separate the word

and learn that on its own.

That also applies if you want to change a command

or you're teaching a new command

and the dog knows the hand signal pattern

or the lure and you're trying to put

the original word to it.

So let's say we want to teach Envy to lay down

on command with a new word

and let's pick something completely random that

she's never done before so let's go with potato.

And the key is that I've got to say potato

and then use the hand signal that

she already knows.

Envy, potato.

Good girl.

So the important thing there,

is that I said the word and then moved my hand.

So it's really important that the dog can hear

the verbal word separately

and then follow the body language part

that they already know.

Because if I had said potato,

she's gonna be paying attention

to the pointing hand signal and not be paying

much attention to the new word happening.

I hope this tip has helped you today

so that you can be clear with the commands

for your dog no matter what word you wanna use.

And don't forget to get out and train your dog

because your dog matters.

And I'll see you in the next video.