How Can I Start Training My Puppy
First of all congratulations on your new puppy! We are so excited for you! Now if you’re feeling overwhelmed and unsure of where to get started with training, don’t worry. You’re not alone! One of the most frequent questions we get from our TOC Fam is if we have any resources on how to get started with puppy training. There’s a million things to focus on, so we figured we’d start to pull together a mini guide for you with tips to start you off. This is by no means comprehensive, but we have ideas for you of how to begin with puppy socialization, putting a stop to all of that puppy biting, and training loose leash walking. PS: for even more puppy training tips, including how to think about your puppy’s routine and how to prep them for alone time, check out our Show & Tell pandemic puppies feature.
How to Properly Socialize a Puppy by Starting Simple
There’s a ton out there about puppy socialization, and it can start to feel a bit intimidating. This mini guide is certainly not the holy grail, but hopefully it gives you some helpful info and maybe a few ideas.
First, socialization is SUPER important. But please know that it is not the ONLY thing that impacts how your dog shows up in the world. Puppy genetics, environment during gestation, and early life experiences all factor into how your puppy grows up and interacts with the world around them.
The socialization sensitive period begins at three weeks and goes on until about 12 or 14 weeks (exact end is unknown and may vary based on breed). At its core, our socialization efforts are about making the world “normal” for our dogs. Dogs today live in a pretty diverse environment, so we try to slowly introduce them to the situations they’ll encounter in their lives. We are aiming to do this without creating stress -- we want them to have positive associations!
The life you plan to live with your dog may impact what priorities you have for socialization - it’s good to think about what their world will look like and help them feel comfortable in it. Dogs continue to learn after their sensitive periods, but they are most accepting of novel stimuli during these early weeks (aka these early weeks matter). Here are a few things to think about:
You want their experiences to be positive, so it is important not to force scary things on them. We want our dogs to be optimistic about new things as adults, so we want to build a history of new things being good for them!
Print Dr. Sophia Yin’s Socialization Checklist for some ideas of things to socialize!
Socialization doesn’t always have to be some huge event like a trip to the hardware store (though that can be good too depending on the pup). Sometimes it is teaching them that it's normal for objects to fall over (like in the video above)!
Avoid using food to “lure” your dog towards scary things as much as possible. They may start to think food in your hand is a “trick” and that is a tougher problem to solve.
How to Start to Socialize Your Puppy So They’re Calm Around People
One of the most important things you can do when you bring a puppy into your life is to help them build positive associations with the world around them. It’s also great to reinforce them for offering you attention. (PS: we have tons of games to help your puppy learn to offer attention in Attention Unlocked). In the video above, Jaya (who is only 13 years old!) is working with her three month old puppy, Daisy, on a city sidewalk to help her learn how to feel good and calm around people. Prior to taking their show onto a busy sidewalk, Jaya built a strong reinforcement history with Daisy for offering attention (eye contact) in lower distraction settings, which makes it a behavior Daisy is likely to offer. Here is a breakdown of what you’ll see in this video:
Out on the sidewalk, Jaya captures any eye contact that Daisy offers by simply marking and rewarding.
When Daisy spots some people walking by, Jaya waits (doesn’t nag Daisy). Daisy chooses to look away from the people and back at Jaya, so Jaya marks and rewards that eye contact.
Daisy looks back at the passing people a couple more times and each time, chooses to disengage from them and offer Jaya attention (which Jaya reinforces with a treat). Seeing a new person is becoming a cue for Daisy to offer Jaya attention.
There is SO MUCH to love about what both Jaya and Daisy are doing in this video, including:
Jaya’s marker and reinforcement timing is awesome! She does a great job of reading Daisy and chooses to give her space to process the people passing. (If she didn’t think that Daisy would disengage from looking at the people on her own, she could have marked the moment Daisy noticed the people rather than waiting for Daisy to look at her.)
Daisy is building positive associations with people (socialization!) as she learns that people predict good things for her (treats!), and she is also learning that the behavior that pays in this situation is giving her human calm attention.
Being able to engage with her human let go of the stimulus (new people), sets Daisy up well for SO many other behaviors: loose leash walking, recall, chilling outside a cafe, etc.
How To Teach a Puppy Not To Bite
If you’ve ever questioned if your adorable puppy is actually a shark in disguise rather than a dog, you are not alone. It’s super normal for puppies to nip.
Two of the most important things you can do to help with your puppy’s nipping are 1) management (aka setting up the environment to avoid a lot of that nipping when possible) and 2) sleep! Puppies often nip when they are tired, and puppies need A LOT of sleep! It’s really important to create spaces where they are comfortable and can take a snooze. And if you know they have a witching hour every night, that is where a pen and a nice frozen Kong can be your bff (just avoid the situations where you KNOW the nipping is going to be too much).
If your puppy does start nipping you (especially while you play), you can try redirecting them to a toy or a chew. I try hard not to correct biting (puppies are super impressionable). You also can’t guarantee what you are actually punishing. So often, that nipping is playful, and they are just trying to engage with you. As your puppy grows up, you are going to WANT them to want to do things with you. So see if you can help them find a better way to interact with you! If you are about to have your fourth pair of pants ripped, try to calmly separate yourself from them (perhaps just step over a baby gate) and give them some nice puppy enrichment in your place. And then take a mental note to keep trying to set them up for success, so you aren’t always having to dip out.
In addition to all the management and everyday life moments, I love to do intentional sessions where I teach a puppy how I DO want them to interact with me and my hands. So often, the question is “how do I get my puppy to stop biting my hands?!” But what happens if you change it to “How do I teach my puppy to calmly hang out when my hands come towards them?” There are lots of ways to go about this, but the video above shows you a progression with an adorable baby shark named Hana!
Getting Started With Training Your Puppy To Walk On a Loose Leash
The video above features, Otter, a standard poodle puppy, and a beloved member of our #TOCFam along with his crew, Alexis and Bunny. Like all puppies, he is learning about SO MANY THINGS (leash walking hardly scratches the surface). Even though leash walking may very well become an important part of your dog’s life, it is important to give your puppy space to explore and develop balance and fine motor skills.
Did you know that a canine’s “normal walk” is a trot with an S-curve to it?! In other words, they walk faster than we do and definitely do not walk straight. Asking a puppy to walk straight and have their head lifted up to you all the time can actually be quite wonky for their developing bodies (may lead to a really unnatural gait). It can also rob them of the ability to learn about the new world they find themselves in!
So what might loose leash “training” look like with a puppy:
Vast majority of the time outside can be spent in spaces where they can safely be off leash (or have a long line on) and are free to stop, lie down, and explore.
You may even consider using a ten or 15 foot leash for any walks you do to simply prevent pulling and to meet their needs.
In the context of these free walks or outings, keep an eye on them to see if they choose to offer you attention or check in with you. If they do, reinforce that behavior, and watch how they start to show up near you more and more! Who knows, you may get loose leash walking just from this!
You can build in really short training sessions (30 seconds to two minutes) where you simply take a step or two and then give your puppy a treat if they took a step or two with you. This allows you to build the “leash walking” behavior before you ever put that leash on (so the leash doesn’t become a steering device).
For more loose leash walking tips, check out our mini guide here.
