Smart Dog School
March 4, 2008Considering the news of our upcoming arrival, Brian and I decided we really needed to take care of the last addition to our family and get her in line, considering that we anticipate we will be neglecting her once the baby is born. So we signed young Posh up for Smart Dog School in Saratoga. Since we kind of dropped the ball on puppy school, we signed her up for a Foundations class, which I have learned is basically “all the stuff you should have taught your puppy and are dealing with now because you never did before.”
Last night was owner orientation, or parent orientation as I like to call it. It was owners only, no dogs allowed. I quickly caught onto the fact that this was more of a class to train Brian and I than it was to train our dog. We learned about how dogs learn and how badly we mess them up by responding to them the way we do. We learned all the things we have to start and stop doing so we can live in peace with young Posh.
We also learned that food is the best incentive ever to get our dog to obey us. So I’ve come to the conclusion that in order for us to have a pristinely behaved dog, she is boung to end up overweight. Our only homework was to start using this clicker-trainer, which basically means every time we click she gets a treat. We did a lot of clicking last night.
Next week we bring the dogs along. Our class has nine dogs…two labs, a mastiff, a couple shephard mixes and a terrier…and little Posh. It should be interesting to see how she does with dogs twice her size. Posh is usually quite the aggressor in “social” situations but I’m thinking that might change significantly next week…
She’ll be so cute. And, don’t we all respond to food as an incentive? Bring on the dark chocolate, baby!
They need classes like that for cats. I’m pretty sure our cat has US trained…
You’ll have to give me some tips. Sparkie is pretty good, but we all can use improvements!
Heather - I think you could train me to do anything with adequate amounts of the right food (which right now would be Cheerios - I love them!)
Jon - I think that’s how it works for most cat owners. I’ve never seen ads for a “Smart Cat School.” I think because they already are…smart enough to train their owners!
Pam - I will pass on my wisdom from this great education I’m getting
Libby,
That’s awesome! Especially when Posh learns how to program your VCR, make gourmet dinners, solve the Rubik cube in under a minute, just like Sparky has after his first session! Well, maybe he hasn’t quite mastered all these yet, but it’s going to be fun for the three of you. You’ll find that you and Brian will work even more as a team and that yes, you two will actually have to work at it (you thought homework was over after college). Posh will be an awesome student, I just know it. Sparky is saying “Hi Posh” in 15 different languages!
Glad to hear Posh wil no longer be bitting our socks when we visit.
Scott and Rachel