Educating Your Dog

Bearing in mind that the circumstances of every dog owner are all different, as well as how they want to train their dogs, all you have to do is create the organized stimuli which will obligate your dog to adopt a behavior that is appropriate to his habitat.

An adult dog is educated with firmness, whereas a puppy is trained with subtle insinuations of how he is to behave. This is done with patience, imagination and tenderness.

Your dog will mark the rhythm of his progress in relation to the ability of his master and to the time which is dedicated to each task. The puppy will also indicate a lack of attitude towards certain exercises. Nevertheless, patient and loving tenacity will result in your dog's advancement.

The younger the puppy is, the easier it will be for him to adapt to the elements that are part of his environment. There is something you must do while your puppy still wobbles and falls over. You must carry him in your arms and take him out to the street – avoiding diseased dogs, though. This recommendation comes in conflict with what veterinarians say about puppies staying at home until they have received their vaccines.

When the puppy get used to and familiarize himself with the noises, movements, visual attractions, olfactory and touchable stimuli that are around him in the city or country, before he turns 7 weeks old, he perceives them as his own. If this happens after the seventh week, he might reject them or not be open to them.

If you have a pretty balanced puppy – neither jealous nor aggressive – you can start to teach him basic principles of living together.

Remember that you should never hit or inflict physical injury to your dog. This conduct must be the same both with a puppy and as with an adult dog. Violence is always counter-productive because it provokes a sense of insecurity, which can derive in aggressive responses from your dog – or he might even run away.

In order to inhibit any unwanted tendency or habit, you have to act immediately after the incident has occurred. Otherwise, your disciplinary measures won't be associated with the wrongful behavior and can actually result in collateral secondary conducts which you might interpret as progress. An example of this is when the dog owner comes home and notices that his dog bend his ears down and runs off. The owner, faced with this behavior, thinks that he has done something wrong. That's not the case. What happens is that the dog associates the smell of his feces with the arrival of his owner and the ensuing bickering and scolding of his owner. The scolding has a negative effect on the bad habit that the owner wants to correct.

If you notice your puppy is peeing on a carpet or on the floor, simply grab hold of a book and slam it shut so that the noise can immediately interrupt his urination. That way you can pretend to be unaware of why the dog is befuddled and the dog won't notice your anger for having done something wrong. Right after that, take the puppy to the place you have separated for his physiologic needs and accompany him while he proceeds to keep on urinating, offering praise when he has finished successfully. You can award him with something like a cookie.

The key here is to be on the lookout and not allow the puppy to go pee or poop wherever he feels like doing so. This, naturally, takes time and patience, but don't get discouraged because a job well done will bear fruit very soon when the puppy associates his doing physiologic needs in the right place and the resulting award.

In every similar situation, you'll have to repeat the same operation until the puppy learns how to earn his award. Motivation is used as a fundamental norm in every learning process.