Dog Training – Essential Guidelines to Consider

Dog training is a process through which a dog learns how to respond to his owner’s commands and how to cope with different situations. This process usually involves several learning techniques, such as classical conditioning, operational conditioning and non-associative learning, and this way the dog gets to perform various actions. Dog training usually aims to achieve the basic obedience of the animal. In special situations, it can also be educated to help people with disabilities, become a guard dog, sport or detection dog as well. Luckily, these animals have very powerful natural instincts and can easily cooperate with other dogs and people. It is not extremely difficult to teach them how to respond to different signals and how to interpret them in a certain manner. In general, people keep dogs for protection or as pets, because of their widely-known loyalty. In these cases, it is important for them to be educated too and to know how to obey their owner. Also, communication between the dog and its master is very important too. The owner’s signals must be understood by the dog and interpreted correctly.

Therefore, basic training classes include teaching commands such as -Sit-, -Down-, -Recall-, -Stay-, -Stand- and , of course, the -Toilet Training-. In order for these commands to be learned, small corrections need to be applied. These can be either physical or mental and differ for each type of dog. Negative punishments are not pleasant, but they have beneficial effects and are a basic part of the training process. Moreover, it is recommended for the dogs and their owners to attend the classes together, to get used with each other and create a strong bond between the pet and its master. This way, the enforcement of the regulations will be assimilated much smoother.

What is more, it is advisable for dogs to begin training at an early age and only after they have had all their vaccinations done. Participating in training classes from the age of three of four months will enable puppies to socialize and be placed in their permanent homes as early as possible. Also, they can be trained individually and the process usually lasts up to eight weeks. Among the most important things is for the puppy to acquire discipline, and patience of its owner. It also eases the process of raising a healthy, happy dog, in a safe and comfortable environment. Dogs tend to express themselves in several ways, such as whining and biting, and it is very important to get rid of these habits in a correct manner, or it will result in unpleasant changes in its behavior. Finally, house training plays an important part in the whole process, and consistency is the key to a well-educated dog.