Justas important as teaching your kids how to act around others properly, dogs needto learn the appropriate way to say hello to people, as this will inevitably bea part of their everyday life while living as a family member. In fact, I haveyet to meet someone who enjoys it when a stranger's dog abruptly introducesthemselves by jumping all over them - talk about HELLO! In short, teaching yourpuppy how to greet people properly is simply good manners. This can and shouldbe taught correctly from the very beginning of your training, and it is nevertoo late to get started. It is better today than next week, but next week isbetter than next month.
When avisitor arrives at your home, imagine what you want your puppy to do… I picturemy puppy calmly walking over to the person, sitting at their feet, and waitingfor the person to acknowledge them. In reality, it looks more like this… mydoodle excitedly walks over to the person, tail wagging to the point that herlittle bottom is moving from side to side. She then sniffs their pant legslightly and plops her behind on the floor, looking up at the person as if tosay, “Please, please, oh please, pet me!” If she likes the person, herwhole body wriggles with excitement as she tries her hardest to remain seatedfor attention.
Eventhough my puppy’s actions may vary slightly from the nice and relaxed versionin my mind, my puppy did in her own way exactly what I wanted her to do. Therewas no jumping, no pushing, no licking… she controlled her excitement and sat,waiting for attention, and this was important. Remember that your dog is aliving being with a mind of their own. As they learn, we should always remainpositive and reward the good, better, and best behaviors. I would focus onmarking and rewarding the polite greeting of sitting for attention, even thoughtheir version of sitting for attention is a bit more exciting than what waspictured in my mind, and I will continually work on fine-tuning it as they getmore experienced; in the beginning, making sure to reward their efforts as longas they are in line with what you want them to do.
Ifyour puppy is TOO excited to sit initially, try tossing a food reward AWAY fromthe person. Your puppy will turn to get the food. Once they turn back to theperson, throw the next food reward away from the person. Repeat several timesuntil your puppy learns the game. Then try getting your puppy to sit to sayplease for the next food reward to be tossed. This game allows your excitedpuppy to move while keeping their attention away from the person and all fourpaws on the ground.
If youhave a puppy who is not so excited about greeting others, that is ok. Try this…every time your puppy sees a stranger, turn and walk away from the person asyou feed your puppy food rewards. Once you are a distance away, where yourpuppy starts to relax, ask your puppy to “SIT” and then start feeding themsomething yummy while the person walks by at a distance. Continue feeding foodrewards until the person walks by. When the person appears, the food rewardsstart; when the person leaves, the food rewards stop. If you do this every timeyour puppy meets a new person, they will come to associate new people withyummy food rewards, which is a very good thing!
So,this week, think of how you picture your puppy greeting someone and beginteaching your puppy to do it better! Remember from our lesson on free shapingthat you can break the behavior into multiple little steps and reward each one.Use food rewards to help lure your puppy into the behaviors you are looking forand keep a leash on them in order to prevent any jumping. As always, to learnmore puppy training tips, tricks, tools and techniques visit us online at www.baxterandbella.com today.
