Are you making these mistakes while training your dog?

Does your dog obey you inside the house but not outdoors? Does your dog return to you only after you call her for the seventh time?

Does she seem disinterested in training? It’s time to check if you are making any of these training mistakes.

Setting unrealistic goals: Can you do 100 surya-namaskars on the first day of your yoga class? Yet we expect our dog to “sit” for five full minutes, or in a garden filled with other dogs, right when we begin training. Set your dog up for success. Start any training indoors, in an environment with limited distractions. Expect the dog to show the desired behaviour for few seconds initially, and based on success, increase the time frame gradually.

Once the dog shows consistent behaviour indoors, move outdoors or to a busier environment. Since a new environment could be challenging, start again by asking the dog for the behaviour for a few seconds, and increase the time limit gradually.

Not giving rewards that are motivating enough: Vary the rewards you give your dog, and raise the stakes when the behaviour expected is more challenging. So, if you use a biscuit to train the dog indoors, you could use cheese to train your dog outdoors in a challenging environment. Also remember – food may not always be the best reward for your dog!

Rewarding the wrong behaviour: Dogs learn a lot from the behaviour they think are being rewarded for. There is a possibility you may mistakenly reward the wrong behaviour. For example, if your dog is barking for your attention, you play with her or give her a treat so she stops barking. In this situation, what you have rewarded is the undesirable behaviour of barking. The right thing would be to wait for her to stop barking, and in the few seconds before she starts barking again, praise her and give the reward. She then learns that barking doesn’t get her the reward, keeping quiet does.

Are you moving too fast? Some commands are complex, and require multiple actions from the dog. In our excitement we often want the dog to master all the steps at one go. For example instead of viewing a “fetch” command as one activity – break it into shorter tasks for the dog to do – like moving towards the object, holding it in her mouth, getting back to you and dropping it in your hand. Train one step at a time, and be willing to start all over again if the dog fails in any one of the tasks.

Are you training enough? Continue to train your dog through her lifetime. Do short training sessions every day, and introduce new commands every now and then. Be spontaneous and excited about training your dog and you will see her flourish.

(The author is a Bangalore-based canine behaviour consultant who advocates reward-based and positive training for pets, and can be reached at rajeshwari.09@gmail.com)