When you bring a dog into your home, you must be dedicated to helping him be the best dog he can be. That is one of the most important jobs you have as the parent of a canine. Providing him with the essentials for living is one aspect of this job, but teaching him right from wrong should be considered just as important. As you raise your children, you teach them these lessons to make them happy and successful people. Your dog deserves this same assistance and consideration.

Old Dog, New Tricks?

Many people are under the mistaken impression that if you adopt an adult or older dog, that he is past the age to be trained. Nothing can be further from the truth. Dogs are extremely intelligent creatures, and their intelligence does not decrease over the years. If anything, they get smarter as they get older. Yes, they may be a little more set in their ways and a little less eager to jump on the training bandwagon, but with the love, support, and consistency of a good parent, any dog can learn better behavior.

Too Young To Learn

Alternatively, another myth with dog training is that if you begin training too early, your dog will not be able to learn because she is too young. This is not true, either. No matter how young your puppy is when you bring her home, start your training immediately. They are essentially babes in the woods and do not know how to interact with the world around them. You are responsible for showing them what to do and what not to do. Without this guidance, she will run amuck and get into things and damage your belongings, as well as injuring themselves or others.

Positive and/or Negative Reinforcement

Whether you are raising a human child or a canine one, you will hear a lot about positive and negative reinforcement. Positive reinforcement is when you see that your child is doing the right thing so you pat him and speak to him in an approving voice and tell him what a good job he did. This is a very key part to almost any type of successful training activity. When a puppy or dog is told that she is doing good things and getting positive attention based on her actions, she will want to continue doing these things. She wants your love and approval, so she will do what she can to get it. Your dog is extremely smart and will make the connection between her actions and your reactions. Many owners choose to use a higher pitched voice when conveying approval. Dogs do respond well to this.

Negative reinforcement is basically the same process, but it is something you do when she has done something she should not. Based on the rules of negative reinforcement, when your dog does something bad or dangerous, your reaction should be negative. You should speak to her in a low and unhappy tone, telling her that his action was bad. This does work, but should be used sparingly. If your pooch is always getting negative reactions to her behaviors, she will go through life an unhappy, maladjusted dog. She will become nervous and worried about pleasing you and could even develop anxiety problems.

Positive Reinforcement Only

This tact has been used very successfully for many people, including various types of law enforcement personnel when training their dogs. Using only positive reinforcement to help your dog understand what she is doing right and completely ignoring any bad action is a mainly passive type of training. This can often take longer, but has been proven to work long term much better than other training methods. Using this method, the only time you give your dog any attention for doing something negative is if what she is doing will endanger he in any way.

No matter what type of training you use with your dog, make sure that you reassure her of your love and acceptance. You are doing what is best for her, which makes you the best parent you could ever be.