People of all ages love the companionship of a pet, and dogs are by far one of the most popular choices. During infancy and in the early months of their lives, dogs tend to exhibit a personality filled with mischief, often leading to unintentionally destructive behavior. Read on for training tips that apply to all dogs.

Make sure that you use control to reward your dog’s good training behavior. Giving a reward for an appropriate behavior is correct, but do it quickly and move on. If you get excited, the dog will become excited and everything will be out of control. Therefore, remain calm and expect your dog to act calm. Once this is accomplished, reward your dog.

When house training a dog, keep in mind that whatever they take in, they must eventually eliminate. If you want your puppy to relieve himself with regularity, keep the diet regular too, like feeding him good food two or three times daily at consistent intervals. Doing so allows you to gain a clearer picture of when your puppy might need to relieve himself outdoors.

Be certain your dog knows that you are the leader of your pack. Make sure he knows that you know what you are doing and are in control of the situation. Then he will look to you and defer to your judgment. For example, when you walk your dog you must be in front and you should insist your dog follows behind you.

You should pick a phrase to say to your puppy while he is being house trained. By using a dedicated expression to handle training commands, you can make it easier for your pet to focus and make connections. Although it sounds silly to repeat something like “poopie time!” over and over, the consistency will help your dog make the right link between being taken outside and relieving himself.

As your dog gets better with training, you can start to give him or her more freedom. By having obedience along with freedom, your dog will have a happy life. Just be cautious not to give too much freedom at once, as this may have a counter effect on your puppy training.

When training your dog, one of the first commands they should be aware of is the “drop” command, which lets them know they should drop any items they have in their mouth. You can use this command for a number of purposes. For example, it is used to prevent the dog from chewing on something or even to guide them out of harm’s way.

Training Sessions

Over-training your puppy will expose it to too much at once, rendering the training less effective. Puppies can’t pay attention for too long and are not very good at focusing on something for long periods of time, so limit the duration of training sessions. If you try to teach too much, he won’t like the training sessions and won’t remember everything. This will only frustrate you over time.

An effective training tool is to use different tones of voice for various commands or purposes. Command and praise should differ in tone, as should corrections. Commands must be sharp and firm, corrections should be loud and praise should be given in a natural tone.

Having a well-kept home and owning a dog doesn’t have to be a ‘one or the other’ scenario. Having a rowdy or destructive dog can make it difficult to maintain a presentable home, but training your dog can easily fix this problem. Learn a few tips to training your dog and you can have a well-behaved dog in no time.