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My 3 month old pup is not doing great in training. I have training sessions with her daily, but she doesn't see, to catch on. I make the training sessions fun, with treats and praise, but she ignores praise and greedily lunges for any treats. I never hit her or abuse her or force her into doing something, and she never had a former owner who did that either. I'm consistent in commands, i never change them, and I use hand signals too. She doesn't seem to be very focused when we are training. I'm trying to teach her sit, down, stand, and come. Sit is pretty good, but she doesn't usually obey immediately and half of the time she lays down when I tell her to sit. I know not to repeat commands, so I'm not sure what is wrong. She usually ignores the command down. She knows come very well, but she also knows that when she doesn't have a leash on, there is no way I can make her come. She also ignores the command stand. Any advice on what I could be doing wrong?

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She sounds pretty normal for a 3 m/o pup. I have a 4 m/o currently. She's sassy, pushy and full of herself. It takes lots of patience, lots of consistency. We're making good baby steps. I think of training as more of a process where you shape the behavior towards what you want instead of them knowing and doing what you want at that age. I'm generous in rewards and start out low in expectations. My pup had a great recall at 3 months. Now? I use a long line and lots of treats. It's life with a growing pup

 

A third of the time she's brilliant, a third of the time kinda ADD and a third of the time she's kinda like this

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Agree with what the others have said. You're hoping for far too much from such a young puppy. I'm working with my first BC pup so I'm no BC expert by any means. But I've trained several other dogs over the years, and I can tell you that I do always start training them very early, but only with the expectation that it will be much work on my end with limited success. I don't think there is any harm to starting as early as you are, as long as you can be patient and avoid getting frustrated and/or angry over the limited results. As time passes, she should start to gradually respond better and better. For me, dog training is a unique and enjoyable undertaking that requires consistency, persistence, patience, and above all, lots of love. I'm of the opinion that the more your dog knows you love her, the better she will respond to training and the more enjoyable it will be for both of you - in due time.

 

I must also say that my BC pup had me pulling my hair out when she was very young. She is 7 1/2 months old now and coming along very nicely. She has really settled down considerably, but still doesn't always obey all of my commands.

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This is off topic for everything but Kolt's voice in that video is SO similar to Molly's (when in the same situation, even, ie: not participating in play), that it's kind of creepy.


Also yes. My pup is 5ish months old. He's coming along, but seriously. They're babies. Work toward what you want to see when she's two and expect it to take time to get there. Nothing here says 'problem' to me, just 'puppy'.


And I also start training super early but my particular method is introducing training METHODS to them, rather than worrying about specific behaviors when they're that little. What markers are (clicks and the word yes mean treats), how to shape, how to follow a lure to get the treat - I usually get some decent behaviors early but on cue? I don't even try until somewhere approaching 4 months. It's just better for my frustration level.

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How exactly do I teach training methods?

 

I'm not sure exactly what you're asking here, but my initial reaction is that you don't teach methods to the dog. You learn the methods that you then use to train the dog.

 

If you're not experienced enough with dog training to know what methods you're using, I think the best thing you could do is enroll her in a puppy class. Actually you enroll yourself so that you can learn how to train the dog. The trainer teaches you the methods so that you can practice the exercises between classes.

 

There are various approaches to dog training. Personally I feel that positive reinforcement (i.e rewards based) training works best with puppies and especially breeds as sensitive and generally willing as border collies.

 

You can, of course, learn through books and videos you'll find on line, but the feedback you'll get from a trainer who can see what you're doing and explain what you might mot be seeing is invaluable.

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Thanks for the help. How exactly do I teach training methods?

 

I think she's talking about me, GL and my mention that I familiarize the dog with various methods of getting things out of me. Really, it's basically down to picking any stupid, easy thing and teaching the dog that:

A-) If you say yes, it did something right and it gets a treat. (Or if you click, or both). Even for eye-contact.

B-) How to follow food in your hand to get the yes/click and then the treat.

C-) 100 things to do with a box type game re: shaping.

 

It's just teaching the puppy that learning is fun and empowering it to understand that it can do things and get a reaction (treat, praise, play) from you, and that it's a game and that it's FUN. The more the dog wants to play those learning games, the easier htings are later.

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She's 3 months old. Her attention span is approximately 10 seconds. To be honest, all I do with puppies that age is let them be puppies. We may work on puppy sits, but that's just calling the pup to me, asking her to sit, giving a treat and letting her go.

She is a baby. A toddler. Let her grow up. All you really need to do is show her how to live in her world. Encourage potty training, teach her rest quietly in a crate but give her lots of supervised play time, introduce her to a leash and collar - but do not demand obedience yet - encourage bite inhibition by giving her correct toys, and teach her time-outs by putting her in an x-pen with chew toys and treats.

If you have never trained a puppy, I would also advise finding a puppy class locally if you can. But most of all, you are not in a hurry and you are not late for anything. Just teach her house manners and civil behavior. Her attention span will slowly increase as she gets older. Best of luck!

~ Gloria

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Ditto to all of the above comments on your puppy's age. Consider that she is like a one and a half to two year old child, and you don't expect that kid to have much of an attention span for learning.

 

I think in training puppies, not that I am any expert at that, the thing to do is make sure the puppy is having fun. Stop as soon as the puppy wanders off. Let her know that if she comes back she will get praise and treat, but don't force her to do anything. At that age I would be happy if the puppy would sit before meals, come when called and sit in front of me, and be just barely starting on some basic leash manners. That, even, would be a lot, but I would be working on those things a little bit at a time, along with fun training games. I would never try to make a training "session" longer than about 30 seconds, or until the puppy lost interest, whichever came first.

 

Keep us informed. :-)

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She's 3 months old. Her attention span is approximately 10 seconds. To be honest, all I do with puppies that age is let them be puppies. We may work on puppy sits, but that's just calling the pup to me, asking her to sit, giving a treat and letting her go.

 

She is a baby. A toddler. Let her grow up. All you really need to do is show her how to live in her world. Encourage potty training, teach her rest quietly in a crate but give her lots of supervised play time, introduce her to a leash and collar - but do not demand obedience yet - encourage bite inhibition by giving her correct toys, and teach her time-outs by putting her in an x-pen with chew toys and treats.

 

If you have never trained a puppy, I would also advise finding a puppy class locally if you can. But most of all, you are not in a hurry and you are not late for anything. Just teach her house manners and civil behavior. Her attention span will slowly increase as she gets older. Best of luck!

 

~ Gloria

 

Agree - when I say I start training very young, this is essentially what I mean. The only things I might add would be simple playing fetch, though only in short doses until the pup gets sidetracked which usually doesn't take long.

 

Oh, and the first thing I taught my current pup was to give kisses, which she learned quickly! I think this was actually a fantastic way to introduce her to the whole learning/responsive concept. (And great for bonding too of course).

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