Teaching your Dog Body Awareness

Now that your dog no longer pulls, you may still have problems with the dog bumping into you or getting into your personal space. I like to train all of my dogs especially the Assistance Dogs in training body awareness. The first thing I do is teach the dog how to walk through a ladder. I place the ladder next to a wall and slowly walk the dog through it. This teaches the dog how to focus on lifting their front legs , and their back legs. Once the dog has mastered the ladder, I teach the dog how to back up. To do this I make a narrow area, have the dog face me then I slowly walk into the dog. At first only have the dog to take 1-2 steps backwards. Give lots of praise for these steps. Slowly ask your dog dog take more and more steps. Eventually the dog should be able to move 10-12 ft backwards smoothly. Eventually you want to move to an open area. Start out the same way as the narrow area, only ask for 1-2 steps. Then ask for the dog to take more and more steps, this process will go a lot quicker since the dog all ready has the body mechanics. Next step, you want to train initiation. Initiation is where your dog will jump and start backing up right when you command "back." To train this, when you say back go ahead a move into the dog quickly. Do this several times your dog will start jumping and moving backwards right when you command "back." If your dog is slower you can even lightly step on their front paws. Eventually you can even look for distance, where you stand still and the dog continues to back up.  To train this you want to have a toy or treat (with the Assistance Dogs in Training I only use toys since I don't want the dog to learn how to eat off the ground). Hold the toy/treat behind your back, command "back" once the dog backs a couple of steps backwards  toss the toy/treat behind the dog and praise. Next time ask for the few more steps, and toss toy/treat behind the dog. Eventually the dog will continuously back up looking for you to throw the toy/treat. Below is a video of the finished product. This blog is the beginnings of teaching your dog body awareness. Remember it is important to first to teach your dog slowly the body mechanics of how to back up. Then add initiation, finally add distance. Next week's blog will be more on body awareness. Thank you for reading!