If youโre frustrated that your pup โdoesnโt listen,โ I urge you to consider what your dog is actually hearing each day. Take a minute to examine precisely what youโve been asking and how youโve been asking for it. You may well find that your dogโs listening skills are not the issue!
Anyone whoโs tried to learn a foreign language knows the frustration of hearing the same word used in different ways. โWait, I thought I knew what that meant, but now Iโm not sure.โ Sometimes, just as you think you know what to call something, you hear it called something else. โUgh, nevermind. I thought I was getting this, but I give up.โย
Alas, as we humans try to teach dogs our language, we often confuse them โ slowing their learning โ in just this way. Sometimes itโs because the various people in the dogโs life use different cues, and sometimes itโs because we havenโt thought through what a particular cue really means. Either way, it can result in a dog disengaging in the learning process because it feels like an unwinnable game.
TRICK QUESTION
Hereโs a quiz: Which spouse is using the cue โdownโ correctly?ย
- Dad walks into the living room, sees the dog on the sofa, and says, โDown!โ
- Mom is walking the dog when a toddler approaches. She says, โDown!โ so the dog will lie at the childโs feet for easier petting.ย
This, of course, is a trick question; they are both wrong, because they havenโt gotten onto the same page about their cues! As a result, their poor dog is set up for confusion.ย
If you want your dog to have a solid response to โdown,โ it canโt mean both โremove yourself from that higher level areaโ and โlie on the floor.โ Pick one, and find another word for the other behavior. (The sofa-snoozing cue could be โoff,โ or the toddler request could be โlay.โ)
USE THE EXACT SAME WORDS
The solution is to get everyone in your pupโs orbit using identical word cues. Many frustrated dogs have to try to learn from different family members alternating between the following words:
- Sit or sit down
- Down or lay or lay down or lie downย
- Off or down
- Stay or wait
- Come or here
It doesnโt matter what you choose, it matters that you choose. Have a household meeting (or a meeting with your inconsistent self!) and decide once and for all what to call these behaviors. Then post that list on the fridge as a reminder.
Often clients tell me they need help because their dog โjust doesnโt understand the word no.โ Their instinct is to become more punitive (Say it louder! Meaner! Stomp off!) to make the meaning of the word more clear.ย
What we need to do is give the dog a โYes!โ to do instead. The problem with โNoโ is that it is a blank space, a vacuum. Itโs hard to teach something that doesnโt exist!ย
The way to move from a day of frustrating โnoโsโ to one of happy coexistence is to figure out the impulse that drove the behavior thatโs bugging you, and teach an alternative โyesโ behavior that you like. For example:
If your dog jumps up to greet people, teach her to sit instead. Use a leash to prevent the jump, then reward the heck out of a sit greeting โ crouch down and give all that nice physical contact she wanted. She will learn that sitting is the more direct route to her #1 wish.ย
If your dog begs from the table at dinner, teach him to lie down on his nearby mat instead. Toss a treat over there. Then, every time he steps on that mat during a meal, toss another one in that spot. Once heโs hanging out on the mat a little more, wait until he sits to toss that treat. Progress to tossing treats whenever heโs lying on the mat. Voila! Two weeks later you have a dog who zooms to his mat to lie down the minute your dinner is served. Youโve taught an alternate behavior to begging โ one that actually pays off for him.
If your dog digs holes in your yard despite your endless corrections, give her an approved digging spot โ a far corner of the yard, perhaps, or a kiddie pool filled with sand. Bury some toys in there. The next time your dog starts to dig up your daffodils, instead of the ultimately useless โno,โ just lead her over to the new digging spot and get her going. (Mind you, it may need to be in the shade, because one of the reasons dogs dig is to get to a layer of nice cool dirt.)
Sure, these solutions take some time and effort. Thatโs frustrating. But, have you ever wondered what it feels like to be a dog โ born with very strong instincts to jump, dig, and chew โ and to have everyone mad at you all the time for being who you are?
Itโs only fair to help your dog get to a โyes.โย
DISTINCT DOG HAND SIGNALS
I ask my clients to send me one-minute videos of their training at home, mid-week after our lesson. Thereโs so much to think about โ verbal cue, hand signal, body position, marker timing, treat delivery โ that itโs easy to self-sabotage with one little mistake.ย
If thatโs happening, then each day of slightly messed-up practice makes things worse. This week, I had to laugh because one of my favorite clients was asking her puppy to โtouchโ โ while holding up the same hand signal she uses for โstay.โ Talk about a puppy dilemma!
We could debate exactly which hand signals are best for different cues, but it comes down to personal choice. What matters most is that you think through what your hands are saying. Your pups are absolutely watching; body language is a more natural communication style for our dogs than our verbal cues, so it pays to be utterly clear and intentional with those motions. And have the whole household rehearse those signals together.ย
STAY VS. WAIT VS. PLACEย
Think you know exactly what โsitโ means? Itโs not as simple as it sounds. Some people teach that a sit is simply when the dogโs bum hits the ground. But others teach that โsitโ means to sit and retain that position until released with an โOkayโ (or whatever your chosen release word is). My definitions donโt have to be the same as yours, but we both have to be consistent every single time we work with our own dogs.ย
Thatโs harder than it sounds. Perhaps the best example of the potential for confusing fuzziness comes with the family of cues that generally involve limiting movement: stay, wait, and place. Here are my own usages:
- STAY. When I say โstay,โ itโs like weโre playing that old freeze-tag game: Freeze! Pup should not move. No shifting from a sit to a down, or vice-versa. No inching forward. Head can swivel to watch me, but thatโs about it.ย
- PLACE. When I ask a dog to go to her โplace,โ she can shift positions and move around as much as she wants โ as long as she stays on that clearly defined mat. She can inch forward to the edge of that mat, but not step over.ย
- WAIT. My use of wait seems complicated, but dogs get it 100%! Essentially, itโs this: โYouโre going to get that thing you want, but you need to hang out calmly for just a second, until you get my signal.โ The circumstances (and the thing they want) vary quite a lot. I might mean that I donโt want them jumping into the car yet, or going through the gate yet, or eating their food yet, or grabbing the toy yet. With โwait,โ I donโt care what position theyโre in, and they can move around a bit. But until I say โOkay!โ they canโt go for that one thing we both know theyโre thinking about. It sounds vague, but the proof is in the behavior: The dogs get it, so it works.ย
These three cues illustrate how there can be a lot of similar behaviors that are not actually the same. Are you using these terms interchangeably? Are you using just one of these cues but rewarding as if there are different definitions in different circumstances? If so, Iโd suggest that this is why your pupโs response is not yet rock solid!ย
It sounds nerdy, but truly: Take the time to write out your cues, and think through what they actually mean. Discuss the cues with the household. Then give your pup that nice clear direction, and reward accordingly. You may feel stunned โ and a little guilty โ when you see how smart your dog suddenly seems!ย
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My dogs have always known he difference between “stay” (i.e. stay where you are and don’t move) and “wait” (i.e. don’t follow me but you don’t have to stay in place – or wait a moment while I set your food down and release you to eat), and “down” (i.e. get down from the furniture) and “off” (i.e. stop jumping up on people). Of course I taught them as 2 separate cues and don’t use them interchangeably. And context has a lot to do with it too.
I agree that inconsistency in cues can cause confusion but dogs are a lot smarter than most people (and apparently this article?) give them credit for. Just look at working border collies and the “that’ll do” cue that can mean anything from “come” to “wait” to “stop what you’re doing and do what you’re supposed to be doing (or wait for the next cue),” The dogs always seem to know exactly what it means by the context and rarely get it wrong.