How to Teach Your Dog to Stay Calm

Most dog owners want their dogs to lay quietly next to them at home or in public places. This is not necessarily a natural behavior and your dog should be trained to lay quietly at your feet. This is easy to do by letting your dog know that this behavior will be rewarded.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Dog
• Treats
• Leash

1. Begin teaching this behavior while sitting in a chair. Your dog should be on his leash next to you. Step on his leash in a way that will allow him to stand, but not jump up on you.

2. Ignore your dog entirely if he is trying to jump up. Do not acknowledge any barking, whining, pawing, nosing or other attention seeking behavior.

3. Once your dog is still, pet him. If he resumes mouthing, pawing, or other attention seeking behaviors, stop petting him immediately. Look away from him and ignore him until he is calm. At this phase of the exercise he does not necessarily have to be lying down. This is true especially if your dog is very active. He should be calm and quiet to receive any attention from you.

4. Once your dog is able to lay down calmly at your feet, you may dispense treats to him to reinforce this good behavior. Drop the treats on the floor near his feet. Offer a small treat every 10 seconds as long as he is laying down calmly. Your goal is to go longer and longer between treats with each training session.

5. When your dog is laying down quietly at your feet reliably at home with no distractions, add a cue to the behavior such as "rest". Say this to him while he is doing the behavior, then try saying it to get him to obey the cue.

6. If your dog can do this behavior in the house with people moving around, you may try this exercise outside. If your dog is not able to lay down calmly with distractions, try lowering the distraction level. You may need to practice in the back yard before you try the front sidewalk.

Tips & Warnings

• Dogs like to earn food and attention, show them how to earn it
• The more active your dog is, the calmer you need to be in his presence
• If your dog is not being calm ignore him
• Shouting at your dog only makes him more nervous and anxious
• Any touching, even shoving your dog away only increases his activity level
• Do not allow visitors or people you encounter pet your dog if he is being out of control, this un trains all of your hard work in a matter of seconds.

[Desula]

on 5/26/2008 My dogs are working on this as well. I'm an enabler to their poor behavior. So we've all got some work to do. Thanks for your tips.