People often take an overexcited, stressed or fearful dog around the block for a walk, to a dog park or a group class much too early. If a dog is boisterous or frightened no suitable learning can take place. Exposing a dog to a smorgasbord of overwhelming sights, sounds and smell can unwittingly exacerbate existing undesired behaviours (such as ignoring owners completely, jumping up on visitors and pulling on lead) and leads to new ones.
So what are the benefits to you and your dog of an 'at home' private lesson (s) before considering group classes?
- Your dog spends most of his life in your house and garden where he is relaxed in a familiar everyday environment and is therefore likely to be calm.
- If your dog is relaxed he can think, therefore he can learn. If he is aroused no learning of desired behaviours can possibly take place.
- Your dog is not stressed by joining a group class too early. Any existing behavioural problems such as aggression towards other dogs can become worse by doing so.
- You will not run the risk of being stressed or embarrassed by your dog's unruly behaviour, if any, in front of other owners and their dogs!
- At home there are fewer distractions. You and your dog can concentrate on learning new behaviours or modifying existing ones.
- There is no need to watch someone else getting help for issues that do not apply to your dog, so your time is not wasted.
- You learn at a rate geared to you and your dog.
- You, and all your family, will understand basic learning theory - without which you can never be an effective communicator/trainer.
- You will understand quickly the basic steps involved in a) teaching your dog any new behaviour and b) getting him to respond first time to your verbal or visual signals and c) how to modify your own behaviour (e. g. be consistent, use the same words and identical hand signals).
- You will save on travel time to and from lessons and you will save money.
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IF you then commit to a few minutes daily helping your dog to improve, your desired goals for your dogs will be achieved quicker and more economically.
Once your dog is capable of appropriate behaviour at home there are, of course, significant advantages of taking him to a small, non-threatening group situation – whether that be to a good dog park, club or school. The main advantages for your dog of 'taking the show on the road' are:
- He gets to practice and improve upon behaviours already known at home (e.g. 'coming instantly when called') but now with many more and much greater distractions.
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As a reward for good behaviour with you (e.g. 'walking on a loose lead' all the way to the dog park gate and then 'sitting' before entry) he can then fulfill a most basic canine behavioural need of meeting and greeting and playing with other dogs.
The larger the group class the greater is the instructor's difficulty in providing immediate feedback to individual owners as to what they are doing correctly. This lack of immediacy affects not only their rate of learning but their level of motivation to teach their dog properly.
Perhaps this fact alone explains why private one-on-one lessons tend to be far more effective than group classes: the instructor is able to watch and immediately reinforce desired responses – of the dog's owner!
One of the main reasons for a high class drop out is because owners take an adolescent/adult dog to group classes without first having a basic home foundation. All further efforts at 'training' usually soon come to an end.
Many puppies, once they grow up, become so out of control that they are soon made 'outside only' dogs – which can often lead to further behavioural problems. Or their owners simply give up and their gorgeous 8 week old puppy, now that he is an out of control and even dangerous pest, is either rehomed or euthanized.
Just one in-home lesson, or on occasions one or two more, could so easily have prevented these tragedies from ever happening.
N.B. Dogs with aggression or emotional issues should not go to any dog park or to group class until the reason for the behaviour has first been accurately assessed and the behaviour has been modified with APPROPRIATE strategies (such as desensitizing and counter conditioning) at home.
