Successful dog training is the goal of responsible dog owners. It is not only beneficial to everyone in a household or family but also to neighbors, mail carriers, other pets, and children.

The hard part of course is making a decision on what school of thought to use when training a dog. The best thing to do is to just use some amount of trial and error and decide for your self what will work and what will not.

Training Goals

Training your dog successfully may take some time, but in the end it will be worth it. Consider your goals when training your dog, such as the following:

• To build a report of trust and respect between you and your dog

• To obtain the power to control your dog at any time or at any place

• To wean your dog from a very young age in order for it to be properly socialized

• To achieve results while working with the learning instincts of a specific dog breed

There are many other reasons you might want to train your dog. One of them may be simply so your animal does not tear your entire house apart, and another is so he/she does not drive your household crazy!

Types of Lessons

One major area of training involves teaching your dog to obey you. This requires quite a bit of repetition before your dog is able to understand your commands, such as "sit" or "stay" or "come."

Another primary type of training of course is puppy training. This usually includes such aspects of "breaking in" your beloved pet: Potty training, behavior correction, and boundary setting.

Of course, potty training is often done while your dog is still a puppy. There are a variety of schools of thought regarding this. Sometimes an area in the house is designated for this or the master of the dog takes the animal straight outside.

One of the latest potty training trends is to train the dog to use the bathroom toilet, believe it or not. Sometimes real or turf grass patches are installed in homes, or even a litter box may be used for this purpose.

Behavior correction of a dog usually involves such aspects of training such as preventing the dog from chewing everything in sight or stopping the animal from digging holes. Boundary setting usually involves activities such as teaching your dog to stay in the yard or teaching the dog where he can go in the house or not go in the house. Additional training you may give your dog would serve an entirely different purpose.

Believe it or not, there is ways to make your pet feel more useful. For example, some people teach a dog how to fetch a newspaper or how to spot hunting prey.

Of course, there are more specialized training schools for pets. For instance, companion dogs and guide dogs are available for blind or otherwise impaired or isolated individuals. This would take additional time though.