It's Hard to Train a Dog Without Beating Them

Gracie and I went on a walk the other night. Her heeling was spot on, even though she was wearing her harness that she typically is allowed to go sniff every sniff that she ever did sniff.  When I would stop, she automatically sat, and when we passed a group of children and a stroller, or barking dogs behind fences, she acted like they didn't exist.  To her, the only thing that mattered was me. Not every day is like this, and she wasn't born like this -- but it still amazes me to watch a dog choose to be with me when the entire world is in front of them.

Shortly into our walk, we passed an older man. He had been watching us for about 3 minutes as we got closer. As we got within talking distance, we had some small talk about how well behaved Gracie was and that she was beautiful. And, just as we passed, with sincerity in his voice and a nod of approval, he said,

"It's hard to train a dog without beatin' 'em".

Stunned, a familiar twitch and raise of my left eyebrow alerted me to my ever-present, obvious facial expressions, so I diverted my gaze to my dog, who had her eyes trained on me, with her giant pitty tongue flopping out of her mouth.  I dropped a piece of chicken into her mouth as a dog barked to our left. 

I looked back at the man, my expression now smoothed out.  He meant it as a compliment. A compliment. I tried to take it as such.  He didn’t know I was a dog trainer.  A half-hearted chuckle and head nod as my response, we continued on our separate ways.  Within seconds, the moment had passed. The wind blew, and Gracie sniffed the air while keeping one eye on me. The words stuck with me. They resounded in my brain over and over, and before my brain could gain it's footing, we came upon an owner with a dog on a bright neon yellow shock collar. This dog's head hung so low toward the ground, it's shoulders protruded from its back. His owner told him to sit; her tone, scathing, even though he was doing just as she asked.  His sit was odd and tense, with his parts tucked in under himself so tightly, I couldn't see his tail or back feet.  His hanging head sunk a little lower and turned away from his owner and us ever so slightly as we passed. It was like I could feel him wincing in anticipation.  When she began walking again, she did so with no warning, causing him to be jerked for ward by his neck with the slip lead noose.  I wondered, almost out loud, how many times he had been corrected as we walked by. For what, I wouldn't know.

Dog training isn't always easy. If you have a dog, you are a trainer - like it or not. Some people can get by without really teaching their dogs much of anything, and some can't.  Some love to work at it, some have to work at it, and a lot don't want to work at it. They just want the dog to not act like a dog. 

Stop sniffing.

Stop barking.

Stop digging.

Stop jumping.

Stop chewing.
Stop pacing.

Stop chasing.

Stop trying to be social with every dog you see.
Stop being uncomfortable.

Stop moving.

Stop licking me.
Stop getting on the couch near me.

Stop eating table crumbs.

Stop pulling.

Just stop.

Their world is filled with humans wanting Stops, all day, everyday. And with Stops, come human correction, usually involving pain. And anger. And frustration that they won't stop doing what comes naturally to them.  But unless you teach a different behavior to replace the old behavior, all you teach your dog when you teach them to Stop is avoidance of you or a situation, which turns into learned helplessness.  Both of these owners were only teaching their dogs through pain and punishment, probably because they don't know any other way.

And when you don't know better, your options for the Stops are so limited that the only thing you feel like you have left in your toolbox is pain and correction.  Like an uneducated parent, uneducated dog owners tend to lash out and punish. A lot. Because they don't know how else to get good behavior, they feel as if they don't have other options. 

But, there are always more options. Just because you don't know them right now doesn't mean they aren't there. Imagine what you don't know.  Imagine how many things you could be doing differently, better, in an easier fashion, if only you knew more.  

Research and find a trainer who knows how to show you the multitude of ways to get behavior without hurting your dog, or find the right Facebook group to motivate you, or the right friend, or read an article or book. Ask questions.  Constantly.  Each time, you gain a little more knowledge, and suddenly, your box of options begins to have a few more compartments. It gets a little fuller, and with that, you realize that you don't have to use pain or fear as your go-to, because you have so many other things to try before going that route.

Suddenly, instead of kneeing your dog in the face for jumping, you have 3 or 4 different techniques that all work.

Suddenly, instead of shouting and smacking your dogs when they play too rough, you know how to reinforce polite play and ask for your "enough" cue before things get nutty. 

The worst consequence that I could think of as a child was my mother finding out that I did something wrong. Did I fear her? No. Did I fear how she would react? Absolutely. I was terrified that I would disappoint her, because I respected her and wanted to make her proud.

Did she need to hit me, hurt me, threaten me, beat me, to get proper behavior or to punish a mistake? No. In fact, she didn't even yell. Doing those things probably would have led to defiance and more misbehavior.  The more you yell and punish, the more you are ignored, and the more problems arise.  It's science. 

By using positive reinforcement with children and dogs, you don't need to rely on scaring them into good behavior, and you give yourself more options. Do you know how many times I have heard, "Man, I wish I knew this with my other dog..."?  Your toolbox opens up exponentially because you know more, so you understand how to teach the way dogs/toddlers learn, and they actually WANT to do what you want.  Ask any toddler parent - isn't it more enjoyable when your toddler happily does want you want, rather than you threatening or forcing them to?  It's easier to have a teammate than an adversary. It is the same with your dog.  

And the best part is: they will no longer make those mistakes, because you've helped show them how to make better choices. Without fear. Without intimidation. Without pain. With rewards. With your relationship. With mutual respect.  If you have to ask for respect, you don't have it.  Respect comes from mutual respect, safety, security and love.  Not from punishment. 

When knowledge ends, violence begins.
Keep learning, every day.
Improve your relationship with your dog, every day.
When your brain tells you that you need to punish or hurt a child or dog for something, that should be a red flag that your knowledge has run out. 
Don't let your knowledge run out.

When you know better, you do better. ~Maya Angelou

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There are always situations going on where discipline is needed, and it never involves anger, frustration, pain or violence. If you don't know any better, you might teach these things with punishment and corrections ("eh, eh!", "NO!", shock collar or finger poking). Instead, take a peek at discipline:

EXAMPLE #1:
--->I set down a plate of chicken on the coffee table.  Dog moves in to sniff it, too close for my comfort.  I ask the dog to go on her bed.  She does. After a few moments/minutes, I toss her some chicken to reward her for being on her bed. 

Result 1 - Moving toward the food = being asked to move far away from the food, getting no food.

Result 2 - Moving to and staying on her bed = better option, better result, got rewarded.

I helped her make a better choice, and rewarded that choice for future repeats of this behavior.

EXAMPLE #2:

--->Dogs are getting too rowdy in play.  I interrupt their play by using a kissy noise, and ask them to sit.  I reward them with praise and then ask them to go lay down on the couch.  They do. After a few minutes, I give them the "Go Play" cue, and they begin wrestling again, but this time, with significantly less intensity.

Result: Focused on the good behavior that they had done. Helped them settle and rewarded them with continued play.  Encouraged good behavior, and next time, dogs will be more willing to break at that time, vs amp up.

EXAMPLE #3:

--->Dogs rush the door to get outside, knocking into me, the door and each other.  I begin opening the door only when they sit, and if they stand or move to leave, I say nothing and close the door.  They learn that access outside is only awarded when butts are on the ground.  Result: they learn self-control at the door, and then I release them to go outside (reward). No punishment or corrections necessary.

Anything can be taught without pain, fear or intimidation.
Check out the following trainers for more information:Patricia McConnell
Zak George
Sophia Yin
Patricia McConnell
Kikopup (Emily Larlham)
Suzanne Clothier
Diane Garrod
Ian Dunbar
B.F. Skinner
^that last one is kind of a joke,
but TOTALLY relevant :)

Alexander's Law of Stacked Bad Luck

How many of you remember this book? Now, keep it mind while you read...

I woke up one morning, around 7, and as I stumbled to the bathroom, I stubbed my little pinky toe on the metal bed post. %*&#! You know how bad that hurts, right? Especially when it’s the little one, because it gets bent all sideways and feels like it snapped off ‘cause there is no toe on its one side?  Anyway, I finish peeing and inspecting my pseudo broken toe and I walk out, and freeze, staring at a giant pee spot on the carpet. HUH? What’s that all about? Gracie never has accidents…? So, I walk around the spot, downstairs and I’m looking under the sink for carpet cleaner. First, I can’t find it, so I’m knocking everything over in the meantime, getting angrier and angrier and then I finally find it in the wayyyy back and there are two. One’s almost empty and one’s full. Being that my toe is throbbing and I just want to hurry up and clean the pee so I can get in the shower, I grab the full one so I don’t have to pull the trigger 317 times to get a half-ass foamy squirt out.  I am pretty much at the end of my rope. So, I stand up and my legs are all achey from squatting for so long and I walk three steps and the bottom to the freaking bottle crashes to the floor, leaving me with the stupid trigger in my hand and a gallon of cleaner E V E R Y W H E R E.

UUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So, I violently clean up the spilled liquid and am holding back tears because I’m so mad at all the stupid things that have happened in like 7 minutes and then I kinda clean up the pee and without another word, I got in bed, covered up, reset my alarm and decided I needed to start my day over in about a half hour. I was way over my threshold.

"I went to sleep with gum in my mouth and now there's gum in my hair and
when I got out of bed this morning I tripped on the skateboard and by mistake
I dropped my sweater in the sink while the water was running and I could
tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day."

Read this blog before continuing:
 http://reactivechampion.blogspot.com/2013/06/the-stress-bathtub.html

No, really, go read it.  

If you're a big jerk, and said, “Yeah, yeah, I’ll read it later” and skipped it, then here’s a summary of the analogy:  
Each dog has a bathtub in which their stress fills or drains.  Some dogs start with an empty bathtub and some dogs that are more anxious or unstable start with a partially filled bathtub. As stressors occur (dogs walking by, a loud noise, being yelled at, hurting yourself, anything perceived as upsetting), the bathtub fills a little bit more.  If a dog has no pre-existing stress in his bathtub, then he can handle a lot of stressors before his stress runs over the top and he goes over threshold.  If he is already starting with a half-filled bathtub, it only takes a few things to send that dog over threshold.  Now, the greatest thing about this analogy is a bathtub isn’t like a bucket. You can’t just dump it out and start again. All dog’s stress drains differently. Some drain slow, some drain quicker, but for all dogs, once threshold has been reached, learning stops occurring and it’s going to take a good 24 hours or more for that dog’s stress levels to recede back to normal.  Amazing, right?

Thinking back to my terrible morning – had all of these things occurred in the afternoon, after I had been awake for awhile, it probably wouldn’t have had such a pronounced effect on me. But, the timing of when all of those stressors occurred, back to back to back and so early in the morning, was a perfect recipe for going over threshold. As a human, I can say, “WOAH. I need a break.” As a dog, they try to tell us in the only way they know how; barking, reacting, whining, whimpering, running away, mouthing, shaking, etc.

Here's an example of a typical walk with stacked stressors: Unbeknownst to you, your dog stepped on a pinecone on your daily walk so keeps leaning into your leg 'cause his foot hurts, but you fuss at him to stop, so he does, but his foot still hurts.  Then, a dog runs up to his face and wasn't being nice at all, but he kept his cool and when you started walking again, he had to poop, but you kept walking, cause you thought he was just sniffing again, so he had to keep walking, too.  And then, when he couldn't hold it any longer, he stopped to poop but it was on the sidewalk and he got choked cause you kept walking and then when you turned around, he got scared you'd be mad, and then a flock of geese flew overhead right as a dog walked by and looked in his direction, and he suddenly goes ballistic.  Lots of stressors, not one of them is a huge deal, but allllll stacked up - BAM. Over threshold.

If your dog goes over threshold, have the courage to say, “Ok, we’ll try again some other time” and go home.  Forcing your dog to cope is unfair to your dog and can have drastic side effects, as well as some redirected behavior onto you.   

Listen to your dog. If you don’t know how, find a local trainer who can help you. Your dog is trying to communicate with you - are you listening?

"Well, what do you do when they're bad?"

I was talking to a friend from college recently and she said, “I know you are all about positive reinforcement to encourage the behaviors you want, but what if they do something bad? Like something they know they shouldn’t do? Do you yell at them?”

I realized at that moment, that in all my passion to post all of these ideas of how to teach your dog what TO DO, instead of punishing for what you don’t, I neglected to state what I do in the interim: like when my dog chases my cats or jumps up on the counter. Those are things that I’m not willing to ignore. Nor, do I. 
 

I have yelled at Gracie, I have smacked her butt a time or two, but what I use most often is the equivalent of when your Mom would say, “You’ve really disappointed me” and I say, “No, ma’am, that is SO SAD.” I say it in the same tone every time and each time, she goes to her bed or the couch and puts her head down on her paws and stares at me. I didn’t explicitly teach her that, but she’s learned over time that I won’t fuss at her anymore if she does that.  After a few minutes, I say, “Ok” and she runs over to me for hugs and love. 

Dogs do bad things. Sometimes, they do really bad things like eat an entire couch, or tear down the blinds in every window in the house, but harboring those emotions will only hurt the relationship between you and your dog.  Allow yourself to act like a 3 year old for a minute and stomp around huffing and puffing as you pick up the minuscule beads from the now-shredded bean bag you just bought your child yesterday.  Your dog knows that you’re unhappy. THAT is why they are cowering, or in Gracie’s case – putting her head down on her paws. It’s not the behavior they did an hour ago or even five minutes ago.  So, after your toddler tantrum, don’t shun your dog.  Think hard about WHY they did it:

Is she bored? Is she not getting enough attention? Did anyone exercise her today? Have we taught her that the bean bag is not a dog toy? Is it anxiety? Who was supervising?

Once you figure out the "Why?", situations like this will happen less and less.  Focus on your dog’s positive attributes and expand on those as much as you can. By strengthening them, you form a better bond with your dog and you’ll find that many of their flaws will shrivel up, and eventually, be a thing of the past.

The Worst Learning Experience

Imagine you are 3 and you're taken to a field. You see a ball, a bat and a glove. You happily trot over and go pick up the ball, but are surprised by a forceful "NO!".  You are super confused, but recover quickly, because, hey, you're 3.  You move away from the ball and far away from that scary person because, apparently, neither are safe things to be around. You wander around and you see the bat lying there. A little more hesitantly, you look around to make sure Scary Person isn't around and pick up the bat.  A few seconds later, you're so absorbed turning this new found treasure over in your hands and trying to figure out what it does. You've never seen something this shiny and round! Suddenly you hear a loud, "NO!" and a simultaneous head smack. You immediately drop the bat and move far away from the area.  At this point, you are too scared to pick up the glove, so you just sit in the dugout trying to figure out your next move that won't get you in trouble.  Scary Person moves in your direction and you panic, thinking about the last two experiences you had in which this person yelled at you and hit you, so you bolt out of the dugout onto the field. Scary Person is even more angry that you moved away from her, and without saying a word, you can tell that she's angry as she strides your way.  You finally sink to your knees, cover your head - shutting down because of the uncertainty and new found insecurity, finally screaming, "I don't know what you want me to do! Please tell me! Give me a hint!"

Sounds like a terrible way to learn how to play baseball, right? But wait, you didn't learn this way? Oh, you say that your parents SHOWED you how to put the glove on and MODELED how to stand, throw and catch?  They DEMONSTRATED how to do it correctly and SHAPED your skills as you became more confident and experienced? Well, that is how learning should be! Bravo to them!

However, the previous example is the daily life of the average dog being trained, or "learning", with aversive methods: E-collar, prong collar, hard leash jerks, alpha rolls, etc.  It is a constant guessing game for the dog. You are waiting for them to do something wrong and then telling them what NOT to do, instead of showing them what TO DO.   If a dog doesn't know what it's doing wrong (like pulling), it will never understand that your hard yank means, "STOP PULLING".  However, giving good things when your dog is by your side will, by nature, make the pulling happen less often. Make sense?

Here's another real world example:

Just imagine trying to navigate and learn a new job and as you stand in the middle of the room, everyone goes about their business but no one gives you any direction on what you should be doing.  You begin to try to figure it out and touch the phone, but are quickly reprimanded loudly, "NO. That's WRONG!" Feeling embarrassed, you move to the copier and just as you move your arm to touch it, a man pokes you in the arm, hard. "NO. That's WRONG."  How many things would you try before you find the activity they want you to be doing? Or would you be so dejected and depressed by the third or fourth reprimand that you would want to wash your hands of the job itself?  Humans would never expect each other to know what to do without someone showing you first. So, why do we expect dogs to do this?

Notice the difference in body language of the same dog: ears back vs forward, open mouth vs closed mouth, eyes averting the owner vs focusing on the owner

Your dog will repeat behaviors that are safe, secure and get him good things. If you tell him clearly what those things are, he will love to repeat them. If you never show him, do you know how many behaviors he will try in the meantime hoping for it to be the right one? If humans learned the way most people teach their dogs, more people would be against aversive methods. Maybe they should start calling the aversive methods what they are, "Figure out on your own what I'm trying to teach you and anytime you get it wrong, I shock/hit/hurt you". Yeah, sounds terrific.

Please consider training force-free. There is a time and place for aversive methods but they are for the animals that need serious rehabilitation and PROFESSIONALS are using it as a tool to ensure the safety of all involved. Force free training may take a little longer but your results will last much longer (not just until the collar comes off) and you'll have a better relationship with your dog. Promise.

Below are some force-free training facilities/trainers in Charlotte, NC.  You may google "Force free trainers in ________" if you are interested in local trainers near you!

Zoom Room - http://www.zoomroomonline.com/charlotte-dog-training.html
 

Tega K9 Training - http://www.tegak9.com/

A Better Dog - http://betterdog1-px.rtrk.com/dog-training/north-carolina/charlotte-nc/index.html

Ahead of the Pack Dog Training - http://www.aheadofthepackdogtraining.com/