15 Říj The three foundational principles of dog sport obedience
The three foundational principles of dog sport obedience
It is a well-known fact that you learn something best by teaching others. My best insights, new techniques, methods, and knowledge often come from my clients. Specifically, from trying to solve a new problem, tweak a technique for a specific type of dog or explain something I have explained a hundred times before in a new way to make it click with that particular handler.
Not long ago, a new client came to my lesson. He was very curious, very new to obedience and he asked a lot of questions. Like, a lot. He wanted to get to the core, to really grasp what obedience is all about. In a single lesson, preferably.
His questions really forced me to boil it all down to the very basics. He practically insisted that I aggregate all my knowledge and expertise and mold it into a few simple sentences. It was an exhausting lesson, more talking than training, but I managed to do it.
The big three
I was able to put the three foundational concepts of a good dog sport obedience into words. I am convinced that if you have all three of these, you are bound to have a good looking, nice obedience routine.
I am also convinced that if any one of these three concepts is lacking, you cannot have a good-looking obedience routine. You might be able to pass a trial. Maybe. But it won’t look good, and you and your dog won’t enjoy it as much as you could.
The three core principles of good obedience are as follows:
- The dog is concentrating on what he is doing.
- The dog enjoys what he is doing.
- The dog knows exactly what he has to do.
That’s it. If you can bring all of this together, you will have an excellent obedience routine. You will get high points at trials and competitions and both you and your dog will love it. But if you are lacking in any of these three departments, it won’t work.
Interconnectivity
Part of the reason it won’t work is the interconnectivity of these concepts. Your dog might be generally concentrated and know what he is doing. But at the same time, he doesn’t enjoy the particular exercise you are working on (lacking in number 2). This being the case, he will find it very hard to concentrate on that particular exercise.
Similarly, if he doesn’t know exactly what he has to do, he will have a hard time enjoying the exercise. It’s no fun when he is constantly guessing how to get his reward. Lack of concentration is incompatible with understanding; the dog can hardly understand something when he can’t concentrate on it.
It is all connected. When one of the foundations isn’t stable, the building will fall. You have to work on all three.
Let’s look at them one by one:
Concentration
Many dogs struggle with concentration. I often see this, particularly when heeling. The dog has a nice heeling position, he enjoys it, it’s energetic, and it looks good. But he can only ever do a few steps before he gets distracted by something, looks away or stops altogether to sniff the grass or chase a butterfly.
Concentration is something we should be working on from puppyhood. Teaching our dog to be able to concentrate on something should be an important part of our training. A good obedience routine demands the dog’s undivided attention or concentration for 5 to 15+ minutes, depending on the routine and level. That is not an easy task for a dog.
Without concentration, enjoyment and understanding are nothing. Our obedience must rest on all three of its legs. So next up:
Enjoyment
I have written a whole article on the importance of enjoyment and how you must make sure your dog likes working with you. To sum it up: it’s mostly in the praise. Whatever you are doing with your dog, please make sure he has fun doing it. Because if he doesn’t, then what’s the point? Furthermore, if he doesn’t like doing it, he has no reason whatsoever to perform at a trial with no rewards.
Dogs aren’t machines. Perfect understanding and laser-like focus are nothing without a wagging tail and shining eyes. Have fun – both of you – and everything will work out.
Understanding
The third core principle can be a tricky one. Oftentimes it disguises itself as one of the two others. Inexperienced handlers who are fooled by this are then trying to fix the wrong problem.
If your dog doesn’t know exactly what he has to do, it often looks like he isn’t enjoying it or that he can’t concentrate on it. But that might not be the case, it might be that he just isn’t really sure what it’s all about.
This is very apparent, again, in heeling. I have seen countless dogs who have a very good hunch about what heeling is:
- They think it’s got something to do with being somewhere near the left leg of their handler.
- They suspect that looking up is somehow part of the equation.
- They guess it’s maybe not a good idea to be too far in the front or to stay too far behind.
But that’s about it. It’s all guessing.
The problem is that this guesswork can sometimes pass as a good understanding of the exercise, mainly if you are practicing only short heeling sequences. While doing 10 or 15 steps, the dog keeps guessing, hoping. But the moment you make 20, 30, 50 steps, his hope declines rapidly. He isn’t sure if he is doing well, and not receiving a reward for so long deepens his uncertainty to the point where he stops enjoying the exercise and starts to lose concentration because he is unsure about himself.
If a dog is 100% sure that he is heeling correctly, he is able (given his temperament and level of energy of course) to heel for a very long time.
I sometimes joke that Archer, given the opportunity, would happily heel for an hour. Why? Well, because he loves it. Because from the time he was a small pup I taught him how to concentrate and because, after much training, he is absolute rock-solid sure what heeling is all about. He has got all three of the foundations, and therefore it works.
And he is a crazy, high energetic, workaholic malinois. That’s part of it, too. May the malinois god have mercy on my soul.
So, to sum up, when you are training, make sure you are working on all of these three core concepts. If you have some problems, be sure to identify what the source is. It will be one of the three though it may not always be what it looks like.
I am in the process of writing books that will help you with all three of these basic principles. I will teach you how to build concentration in your dog and how to train to know exactly what to do and enjoy it very much.
None of this is rocket science, just common sense. Please, always think about your training and try to figure out what’s wrong. Don’t fix problems on impulse or you will probably do the wrong thing. Make sure your dog has fun.
Be mindful.