Easy Dog Training Techniques

Five essential basic dog training instructions for all dog owners!

Easy Dog Training Techniques

Follow these basic dog training instructions as outlined in this tutorial and within no time at all you will have accomplished the five essential basic dog training commands which many dog owners struggle with.

Dog training for many dog owners is very difficult and if this statement is in question then just look at both the owners and dog’s behaviour in your local park or on the sidewalk for confirmation of this!

Once you know how to train a dog or puppy and once YOU know what to do, dog training is incredibly simple as it involves understanding some basics which you then repeat over and over in a specific way.

If you deviate from these basic instructions then you will have difficulties with the dogs learning and progress.

It would be fair to say that you will either get it or you won’t get it, you will either understand it or you won’t.

Take just one command and keep it basic and minimalistic in your delivery and through simple repetition you will have success with your dog.

Do not rush this procedure, take it steady and just repeat a few times a day, each day and within a week you will be able to successfully carry out basic commands.

Remember, professional dog trainers can teach a dog training technique usually within a few minutes.

Someone who knows how to train a dog or puppy can put a basic command in place within five minutes because they know the exact route to take bypassing all the unnecessary ways of the amateur dog trainer or owners who get lost.

Absolute simplicity is the key.

Don’t move onto the next stage until each stage is successfully in place.
If you move onto the next stage or command without mastering the first one you will just confuse both yourself and the dog.

You need to be motivated and excited about your success also. You need to feel you are having excellent progress, you need to feel the buzz and thrill that you are now the dogs trainer and pack leader.

It is essential that these five basic commands are put in place and mastered over a period of weeks and once they’re in place they will be with you and the dog for the rest of his life which is essential for the security and safety of the dog’s well-being and bond with you both.

As you may know, dogs can easily become confused and erratic and if they don’t have a leader or some basic rules, borders and boundaries to follow then they will become the ruler of your household and lead themselves wherever their instincts and senses take them.

As you may know this just leads to a messy untrained and badly behaved dog which will always reflect upon the owner’s lack of knowledge, skill and understanding as to what a dog is required to be like in your company.

Never give in to failure or slow progress.

Once you start, be in a calm and relaxed manner, you should be relentless in your pursuit for the dog to master the command and through exact repetition of the following instructions you will have complete success and experience the thrill of a healthy controlled, less confused and balanced dog.

How many times have you seen dog owners running across the park, huffing and puffing, out of breath as a result of chasing after their dog that as run off after another reward such as another dog, jogger, cyclist or football and shouting at them for control.

Dogs go after rewards and anything that provides excitement and stimulation.

Remember anything can be achieved, the sky’s the limit and you get out what you put in.

You can have total success over these basic commands so don’t let doubt get in the way of your progress.

Do not have any high expectations, take your time and spread the training over one or two 15 minutes sessions per day for the whole week on just the sitting command first.

Step one

You must be in the right mindset which is calm, relaxed and confident. You must be in a determined state of mind where you will have success; you must be calm and assertive with a good strong balanced energy and total patience.

Sitting command

Now that you’re in the right state of mind you should be standing or kneeling in front of the dog without any distractions in a quiet room where nothing else will interfere with your session.

You shouldn’t be moving unnecessarily or speaking or doing anything else when delivering the sitting command and that includes smoking a cigarette, reaching for a drink or eating food.

Delivering this sitting command from the training point of view, should be in a soldier like position with no unnecessary body movements or sounds. Just you and the dog focused!

Ideally you may have around your waist dog trainers bum bag and in that bum bag you will have high quality food, the sort of food that the dog doesn’t normally receive in their every day eating plan.

High-end delicious food will catch the dog’s attention such as pieces of tasty cheese, slices of delicious sausage or slices or shreds of steak.

Although not some of the healthiest of foods they will have him totally focused on that food.
Ideally your dog is now hungry and hasn’t yet been fed and you will have the smell of the food rubbed into your hands.

The dog is standing in front of you knowing you are in possession of this delicious food.

Make eye contact in an assertive way and take out a piece of food/treat in your right hand and raise it up and over in front of his nose and just out of reach and over his head slightly so he follows his head/eyes up and back which will naturally lead him to want to sit down and as his head lifts up and back he will naturally want to put his bottom down on the floor which is a completely natural position for the dog to be in.

Never push or force him to sit down as you will create resistance, he must do this on his own so you must wait with patience.

Raise up the treat for him to follow it back over his head and he will naturally sit down and then when he sits, say the word SIT firmly at the same time and give him the treat and then follow that through with some praise and some physical fuss then return back to the same position again, taking out another piece of food, raising it up in front of him, and slightly over his head and back guiding him to sit down and then repeat the process until he does it on his own.

If when you take the food out of your bum bag and he starts jumping up excessively then you calmly raise the food even higher up repeating the word sit, sit, sit, sit and hold your position until he burns out and stops, wait for him to stop and keep withdrawing it and keep repeating the offering of the food to him over his head and guiding him to naturally want to sit down and when he does, confirm the sit word, give him the treat and then fuss him with affection and physical contact backed up with verbal praise.

Even if a dog is hyperactive and jumping all over the place, if you hold your position and outdo him with your persistent patience then he will stop and sit because he wants that treat and gets board of keep jumping and failing.

Depending on his level of energy or hyper-activeness or even bad behaviours, he will yield, he will stop and or submit to a quiet stillness if only briefly.

There is the stopping point for your success.

You have to outdo his jumping up and down which could be interpreted as his way of demanding that treat now.

You are in effect breaking that behaviour and instilling your instruction or command. You only have to do it once and it will be then in place, a neural pathway in his brain will be formed and although it will need repetition, it will be now in place and as long as you remain patient and persistent and don’t give in, he will give in to you and stop jumping or he will sit down all on his own because he wants that treat.

This is why it is essential you have this strong and assertive mindset or position of delivery because without it the dog could be all over the place.

This is called reward-based training and positive reinforcement with the treat, always repeating the treat over and over each time he complies with the instruction or carries out the positive task, always rewarding that behaviour and ignoring the unwanted or bad behaviour with stillness and patience.
In other words imagine he’s jumping up and down, he is demanding that treat NOW, he’s not complying with you, you become statue still and non-reactive until you break him with your stillness and you’re non-giving in position.

This is why it’s so important for you to be totally focused especially if you have a disobedient, hyperactive dog with behavioural problems.

You could say that this is the pathway through the jungle of his energy to make proper direct one to one communication.

Once this is in place the rest will follow fast.

Remember how important it is to share affection both physically and verbally and then leave gaps or periods away from the training for absorption of the training.

Come command

This is a very important command as it will bring your dog back away from harm’s way to safety and security.

When your dog or puppy runs out your front door or runs out on the street you need him to come back immediately.

Step one

Kneel down in front of him with his lead and collar on with the treat in your hand in front of him and just gently and carefully pull on the leash to guide him towards you in the direction of the treat which is in your hand and as he comes forward start moving backwards.

You only have to do this for a few feet as he moves forward following your hand you say the word ‘come’ and then give him the treat followed by verbal and physical affection and praise.

Only move onto this stage when you have mastered the sitting command, because if your dog is unruly or hyperactive then you need him to return back to the sitting command at least.

These and any other instructions are all very well and easy to follow but in reality, hyperactive and untrained dogs can be all over the place and lead to failure or a belief that this is hopeless.

Once he starts moving forward each time to receive the treat you then remove the lead and make the space greater each time.

Out of all these commands the sitting command is the first one you must master because when you have any difficulty you can also return the dog back to that position instantly. It is essential you don’t move onto any the other commands until the dog sits every time you say the word sit.

Stay command

This command is very important and keeps the dog safe from road traffic or running after other dogs or rewards.

Firstly request that your dog sit and once they’re in the sitting position you place the palm of your hand out in front of you directly in line with their eyes, in alignment with your face and their face and say the word ‘stay’ firmly, whilst moving back at the same time holding a treat in your other hand.
At first you might only be able to move back a little bit, start off slow and then give him the treat and then the praise. Slowly increase the distance each time before giving the treat.

When you first do this you’ll probably have a two or three second time span before he charges for the treat but that brief few seconds of stillness is what you need to focus on and reward them for it straight away.

Leave command

In a seated position offer up to him the treat in your closed hand and allow him to smell it and make nose and mouth contact with your hand and allow him to try and get into your closed fist to obtain that treat and at the same time NOT allow him to obtain it and repeat the word ‘leave’ each time.

And again do not give in to his persistence to get into your fist for the treat then with eye contact and repetition of the word leave, leave, leave wait for that precise moment when he stops trying and becomes momentarily still, that precise moment when he looks at you as if to say ‘what the hell’ then when he stops give him the treat from your other hand or from the bum bag but NOT the treat in your hand.

Don’t move on from this state until you have mastered him becoming still upon the word ‘leave’.
The next stage to this would be the opening of the hand and getting him to leave it, leave, leave, leave and then when he stills and waits, then give him the treat from your bum bag with the other hand followed by the praise.

The next stage to this is the placing of the treat on the floor in front of him and repeating the process, leave, leave, leave and then move back away from both the treat and him leaving the treat in front of him which he will be looking down at and then up at you, start off slow and gradually increase the time before you give him the treat from your bum bag with your other hand always leaving the treat alone on the floor.

Obviously it goes without saying that you never give him that treat which you have used for him to leave!

You might want to think about that for a while so it sinks into your understanding.

There will be a point when your dog looks away from the treat and then looks up at your eyes, that is the moment, the precise moment for you to react with the other treat because that one or two or five second period is what you’re now zooming in on.

As you progress you can move the treat further away so eventually you and the treat can be across the room and whilst he may be salivating and looking at it, he won’t go to it until you give him the treat.

Down Command

With the dog in the sitting position and you kneeling in front of him, offer up the treat in front of his face and then slowly lower your hand down to the floor in front of him so that he follows it with his nose and when you make contact with the floor say the word ‘down’ and he will place his head down and then just slide your hand with the treat in it along the floor slowly in front of him towards you and he will follow this natural progression for him to lower his body down into the down position.

Once he does this offer him the treat and the usual praise and repeat and repeat and repeat.

For some dogs this is easy and they will naturally go down but for some it is difficult because it is a submissive position and some dogs don’t like to take that position easily so persevere.

Keep repeating, lower the treat down to the floor in front of them so that their head and nose follow the treat down and then slide your hand away from them towards yourself so that the front part of the body starts to move forward after it and then they lower down to make full body contact with the floor.

At this stage you may want to just touch the center of their spine with your index finger, ever so slightly just to direct them down but be aware some dogs will accept the gentle touch down whilst others will not and it may distract them. Play it by ear and see how you go.

Be patient and don’t move on from the sitting command until you have perfected it because the sitting command is the default position that the dog must always return to if you have problems or difficulties which you will.

Nothing will ever go to plan

Repeat, Repeat, Repeat.

The difference between you and other dog owners is your persistence to keep going to the very end where as others will give up especially if the dog is older and has bad stubborn habits.

All dogs can be trained if they like food!

Reward-based training, positive reinforcement, affection, verbal and physical praising in a gentle, patient and relaxed approach is the way to train dogs.

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