“To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.” -Anatole France
My puppy “Momentum” turned eight months old last week. This picture was taken during a live training session we did last week for our “Recallers” students…here we where both hamming it up a bit 🙂 At the beginning of each month I put together a plan for my training with Momentum.
My monthly plan for a puppy includes skills from four major areas I would like to focus on for her development.
You will notice on my graphic I also include something each month I call “new adventures”. This is critical for young puppies but keeps life interesting for all dogs. Below is a video of such an adventure we took in September with Momentum and three of her littermates (and Lynda Orton-Hill’s young poodle “Dare”).
In this case “new adventure time” was a fantastic fun filled training session that was both physically and mentally challenging for the puppies. Adventures can also be exposure to “new” and that may just be “mentally stimulating” to a new puppy, or they can be re-visits to places that aren’t “new” but just fun filled and physical challenging.
A Balanced Approach is Rarely What Your Puppy Needs
As you can see from my graphic above, the emphasis I chose to put on each “skill group” is not at all balanced every month. Some areas may have less emphasis while others have a much larger focus of my time. As my puppy matures the amount of focus I put on each of these four areas continually changes. Obviously, when I start out with a seven week old puppy the focus is almost entirely on “family pet skills” and “new adventures” with the small injection of “body awareness” with no attention given to the other two skill groups. I like to include body awareness at this stage because shaping these skills are fun, it is a great way to fatigue the puppy without “throwing a ball” to wear them out and it lays down a brilliant foundation developing a strong body with great proprioception!
With my training there will be many “family pet” skills (such as “Crate Games”) that will contribute to having an amazing obedience or agility dog…so there will be benefits across these areas of focus. However I am not taking a eight week old puppy and teaching him wing wraps or running a twelve week old puppy through a channel of weave poles or running sequences through uprights or short heights with a six month old puppy. Those things just don’t hit my radar until the puppy is much older.
So for our first month my puppy is learning cool things to help develop a strong relationship between us as she grows up both mentally and physically strong. This kind of plan can easily be called “Creating the Dog of Your Dreams.”
This kind of four-way focused approach to raising my puppies has resulted in me owning a puppy that has grown up to be “the dog of my dreams” ….eight times so far!!! It is also a plan that has resulted in me owning eight dogs that have won US/Canadian and World Championships in agility. So there is no need to “choose” when raising a puppy, if you want a great family pet or a fantastic agility dog. I do believe you can have it all … and this is one plan that has been proven eight times out of eight attempts to be one that can achieve “it all”!
When I make my “Focus Plan” each month I first decide where the balance across the four areas shown in the graphic is going to lie. By my second month with the puppy I am interjecting some “flatwork games” that will be the foundation for great obedience and agility skills. My puppies will do Susan Salo type puppy grids, and at around 6 months learn about tunnels, but other than that they don’t get on any “real agility” equipment until they are closer to a year old. Again, it is a plan that helps the puppy to lay down a fantastic strong and flexible soft tissue framework to help support their bones until the time I do think it is okay to move on to “real agility.”
Elements of The Plan
So what I have to share with you today is my plan for my puppy now that she is 8 months old. Each month when I look at my four areas of focus I consider these four elements:
- The Tune Ups! These are the skills that are in need of “re-polishing”. For one reason or another these skills not as strong as I thought they were. It happens to all of us! Go back and fix what is “sloppy” now before it ends up completely broken!
- The Carry Overs. Here are skills that were in my plan last month but that I didn’t have time to train to the level I wanted.
- The Trouble Shooting Skills. These are skills that will help overcome challenges I see at my puppy’s (or dog’s) current level of training.
- The Brand New Skills. Next up will be the brand new skills I want to teach in the next month. These are the “shiny new things” that people tend to get carried away with. That is why I leave them until last.
Investing In Your Puppy’s Future
Of course a plan is just the start! You still need to get out there and put it into action. Make sure you make it a daily habit to train your dog several times during the day. I like to do one session before breakfast. One session before lunch and one after dinner. Ideally I will get in one or two more but knowing that my sessions are only five to ten minutes long that still doesn’t even add up to one hour a day training my puppy. That one hour investment will pay off hugely down the road. A 45- 60 minute of daily training during the first six months your puppy life is an investment with the payout of an amazing family pet for the rest of his life. It is worth making that investment…it is a return you won’t get anywhere else!
Here is that video explaining my plan for Momentum over the next month…
Your plan can follow this format regardless if you’re training a puppy or an older dog. Looking at my plan over the next month with Momentum, I have a LOT of “tune ups!” You see, I have only trained my puppy for three days over the last month. That is because between Sept 29th and October 28th I have been away from home for all but three days. Of course she has been “trained” but not by me! During two of those weeks Momentum was trained by two of my students (one each week) who were watching her for me. They did a terrific job…Jane Book even trained skills I don’t know how to train! How cool is that? However, the rest of the time I was away my puppy got “trained” by my husband John. Now John loves the dogs as much as I do but they get a bit of a “hall pass” when I am not at home 🙂 So the “training” that happened with the puppy is not necessarily work of my choosing 🙂 Really not a big deal if this happens to you. All things can be fixed with “tune ups.”
“Do you wish to rise? Begin by descending. You plan a tower that will pierce the clouds? Lay first the foundation of humility.” -Saint Augustine
“Tune ups” shouldn’t be viewed as a failure. The only failure would be if you ignore what you see and rely on “hope” to fix the direction the behaviour is heading. Hope is a wonderful thing but I don’t think much of her dog training abilities! So yes, perhaps by not jumping into the “shiny new skills” may feel like you are “failing”, but as the quote above states … success starts with humility … and oh, puppies like Momentum do keep us humble!
How is it possible that I love this puppy so much when she challenges me in so many ways? You would think the opposite would be true… clearly it isn’t for me. Maybe this is why young girls often love the “bad a$$ boys.”
Today I am grateful for Momentum, who pushes me to make things clearer, not just for her…but for everyone.
Thanks, Susan! This motivates me to make a more structured plan in my training of my 4 month old puppy. I am working alot on “bed” and am experiencing problems with her barking. (Like you are with Momentum) I try to reward before the barking starts, and not to reward as soon as she is quiet after barking, so that we don’t start a chain reaction. But…I am having a hard time knowing what the best reinforcement sequence should look like to extinguish this barking. I’d appreciate any detailed advice. Thanks so much!
Where can I find information/learning materials on Susan’s methods for teaching basic obedience for sit, down, etc.?
Thank you
Yes, I am wondering the same thing.
Hi Susan, one of my challenges is getting all the training games into my head to be able to plan
Sometimes I find all the information is just swirling around in my head and I can’t sort out where to start each day/week/month– it just becomes hard to make the plan
I am going to try your suggestion of taking the Recallers tips and laminate them placing them in a box. — WIll these tips be colour coded or delineated as to what catagory they may fit into? Pet skills etc?
I operate a B&B year round,teach dance and waitress,so often this schedule leaves little time for training 6 dogs.
I have built training into the dogs’ daily routine, but I have a plan for each dog much like what you describe here. If a pup has gotten sloppy at the door I will work on it in the moment. If I am pressed for time and have no patience left I will fall back on a fetch game. I knew I would miss working on my H360 lessons during the busy season but practicing my tug handling has been a staple from your games. I have been adding Whistle Recall to my pups’ repertoire and have 3 that can now go out in the fields together and get some great exercise in a short period of time before I have to leave for work. It is reassuring to read that you have to constantly schedule and budget time as well. The age and experience of the dog definitely dictates the endless lists.
Great post Susan, very motivating and inspiring for further working with our dogs!
Thank you so much for this post. Gave me great ideas for my 5 year old border mix Jessie’s training. Sometimes it seems like there is so much I want to do with her, and using a breakdown like yours is going to be a big help in our training.
Susan, thanks so much for this. I especially love the breakdown of training areas into manners, body awareness, obedience and agility. This is always in a jumble in my head, so now I will write it down and plan for success each session.????
Thanks, that was inspiring, will plan to do similar with my dog.
Where can I find some more body awareness games / exerises, please?
Ditto that!
Some that come to mind – feet on, feet off:choose an object, e.g., plank, cushion, step, rung of horizontal ladder(skill builder) feet in a box(the box gets smaller-eventually)number of feet in a box(incremental build up)
air mattress – squishy things that make the dog balance their weight.
Balance board(lead up to teeter totter) first balance board is very low to the ground(don’t want to encourage bailing off)
front feet up on something(incremental building)
front feet down with back feet up (incremental building of this)
laying down
handling of feet
I’ve always been rubbish at planning and record keeping, but you’ve given me a real insight into a simple and effective system that works. Thank you Susan. One quick question – do you record keep in the same notebook or do you have a separate one?
Mostly I use a separate one for Record keeping, however I have done it all in the same book.
Love the way you have put this into place especially deciding where to put a bit more effort, and the new adventures too.
Ciaran my soon to be 3 yr old rehome Whippet who came to me in May this year as a very worried young man has been having lots of new adventures since joining ‘Pawsaroundoz’, he has gone from a dog that had very little socialisation, having been bred in the country, then going out into two different homes that were not right for his nature…
We have been having lots of fun new adventures where I have made sure the steps forward were all small and easily handled by Ciaran.
We 3 (me, Ciaran and my older boy Connor) have just returned from a 4 day Blues and Jazz festival where we camped with lots of other people and dogs….Ciaran handled it all very well and I am so pleased with him and the way he is comming along.
I continue to learn so much from you. Thank YOU! When will an online Puppy class or Recallers start? I got a rescue pup that is coming along well and am looking forward to more training from you. I did not have him in time for the summer Recaller class, can I still join that one?
Christine, the best idea is to join our “wait lists” at each site. We are experimenting in the next year with periodic openings for those on the wait lists.
This was a great session and finally I ‘got it’ that I need to have a training plan and record progress. (Sorry – it takes me a while sometimes!)
This morning I have created my first plan for the month of November. – Yay!
I want to include some Body Awareness training as Susan mentions “…shaping these skills are fun, it is a great way to fatigue the puppy without “throwing a ball” to wear them out and it lays down a brilliant foundation developing a strong body with great proprioception!”
I saw that one of these was balancing an object on the dogs head… but what are some other ideas, please.
Brilliant post. Thank you. I have a written list of things to train my 10 month old puppy, and I keep track of what we train. Sometimes I get overwhelmed cause the list is so long, given all the different types of skills he needs to learn and how can I possibly cover all of it. That plus 2 other dogs to exercise, train and attend to. Sometimes I feel like we’re behind in our agility training, but mostly I know we will get there and we will be great!
I believe I did very well with my puppy at least till she was 5 months old. It seemed that I ran out of imagination, or something. Her obedience is good enough to place in the top ribbons in Novice rally (at 11 months now), but I don’t seem well able to formulated new goals. I’d really love seeing some of these ideas in ‘lists’ of performance criteria .. incremental for each age level, so I could figure out what I need to be doing and what it should look like. I have surely figured out that I could have been working scent articles, for example, but it had never occurred to me… duh… Oh well.
We have had Sasha for four months and is active and good at tug of war at the park . As soon as she gets in the car and home she is fearful of me and gets as far away from me as she can. She is much better with my wife and our neighbor lady. I’ve tried everything I can think of to gain her trust . The vet says she’s had severe head trauma , PTSD like. And suggested Prozac. I was excited about this training, but this fear is too great. Any ideas for getting her to trust me first ? John
I have an Aussie pup exactly the same age as Momentur – she turned 8 months last week too. She loves any kind of training, learns FAST and seems to retain everything. An ideal dog for training!
But I’ve been disorganized in working with her, and this plan is just what I need. I can see already it will help me pinpoint what I need to work on, for example, jumping up on people she meets – also like Momentum!
Thanks for this great way to plan. It must be how you accomplish so much yourself!
I got a brandnew 8 months puppy to train and to adopt, because people couldn’t handle him. I guess, just because he is a working dog (miniature american shepherd) but looks like a Border Collie! What I want to say is, I am very keen to use all your tipps and I love the recaller games! And it is no problem that he joined me now in age of 8 months. And…no, I do no Agility exercises so far and will take heaps of time before I start! Thank you so much, Susan kind regards Uta from Germay
Great article keeping focus and having a plan is what we meet thank you
Loved the peak at the detailed plan. I learnt so much just watching and listening. BUT where are the Recaller Games?
Well Monty she is a star at all 40 Recallers Games so they now are always part of our “transitions” rather than our “focus”…I can assure you there are at lest 5-10 in every training session we have!
Thank you for this. My young dog has missed out so much this month, due to college commitments. She behaved yesterday as though she had never had any training! I became frustrated then but your blog reminds me to go back and polish up the basic skills again by reflecting and making a plan.
During September’s AAC sanctioned trial here in St. John’s, NL,
my dog Raven had periods of shutting down or zoomies.
Asked one of the instructors from our club her thoughts. She asked did I have a journal and a plan of my training. Sequencing equipment and rate of reinforcement was important to keep track of. What was happening when she had her…I don’t have to, don’t want to moments. Having a plan she said every training session is as important as having the knowledge of communicating what I wanted. It was Raven’s second AAC sanctioned trial. The first…only one month before in August. Both trials were outdoors and lots of distractions. I am a very novice handler. I had only just passed agility 4. Raven is young, won’t be two until next week. I am learning so many tips from your blogs. Plus your book Shaping Success has offered so much more to my training. Next years AAC trials I will be a better handler and will have proofed a lot more distractions. Thank you Susan!
This is so helpful. I have just arrived home from attending the Australian Association of Pet Dog Trainers annual conference and am all inspired to create some more explicit training programs for my own dogs. I am still new-ish to training and find that working on training my own dogs really improves my teaching skills. But, like most trainers, I put off working with my own dogs or don’t have an explicit plan and just do whatever comes to my mind at that time – neither of which is particularly effective! So this, combined with the awesome information the other experts provided at the conference, is giving me a great guide on how to actually put more effective plans in place.
Thank you!!
Do you have a plan for each of your dogs each months and if so when do you find the time while working 8 hours a day?
Not all of them Sheila. My retired dogs no longer have “formal training plans” for their other than swimming, hikes and their “Big Adventures” …but nothing is “planned” it is now more a “routine.” I do have a plan for each of the dogs that I am continue to compete with. So my time is divided between the puppy, her brother and her mother. Two months ago (prior to the World Championships) my four year old was the focus of my training and my puppy got “just enough” each week while my eight year old got a maintenance dose of training two or three times a week. Now that my big competitions are over for the year the puppy is getting almost all of my focus while Swagger and Feature get some down time. It gets to be a juggling act, but that is what planning is for. As for getting it all done while working 8 hours a day? I own my own company I WISH I only had to work 8 hours a day!!! Get it planned then make it happen!
Talk about the right post at the right time…. I’ve been focusing on agility and new tricks for way too long, my dog’s basic obedience skills have gone to crap…. Thanks Susan for such a timely post! I definitely need a major tuneup with my dog.
I love that quote by Ben Franklin… Way too much of my dog training is not planned out, it’s not my dog’s fault in the least that he has been “slacking” it’s me who REALLY needs the tuneup!
By the way, I just can’t tell you how awesome it is to be able to hear how a wonderful dog trainer has issues with her own dogs sometimes…. And that you never compare your dogs to other people’s dogs! So much to learn from there
Thanks again Susan for a great blog post! 🙂
Thanks for the reminder to plan. We have had a month off because I had her spayed. I did not do half of what I planned for little training bits well we did not do agility or retrieving, things like “down low” head on the floor and crate games refresher. I did not write out my plan, yet I had more ideas. This month I think I will write out a plan because I want to bring her back up to speed and need to do what I did not do last month.
Susan – loved seeing your journal and notes for plans. Would you care to share a visual of what your training notes look like? Maybe it seems silly, but honestly, coming up with a easy way to track the training process that makes sense and is usable as a resource is rather daunting to me. What do those notes look like and how do we really use them?
Over the top information! Couldn’ t get from anyone else !
Yet another blog at just the right time when our teeter behavior has totally fallen apart. Time for a Tune Up! Thanks, Susan.
I need Help. We have an 11 month old pit bull. Her name is Mia. I love her very very much. I have had her at training classes at a Petco for 10 months. She learned how to sit. I can not talk her for a walk because if we run into people or other dogs she goes into this temperament that she wants to go after them. She has never bitten anyone but its getting worse. We can’t have people over that she does not see all the time . we can’t take her for walks in places with a lot of people because of the way she acts. We are trying to buy a house and we would like to get another dog but I need help with Mia first. I can’t really afford another trainer so I am trying to do this all myself and I need help.
Heather please try and find a behaviourist to help you with Mia. It will cost you money, but not the pain of the heartache or liability if she actually does hurt someone. At 11 months of age it is not going to get better on its own. Please do it now! If you truly can’t afford it see if you can’t find an angel fund to help you.
HEATHER, where are you located ? I know alot of trainers who follow along Susan’s lines of training maybe I can help hook you up.
This is a great blog! Time to write this down in my “dog notebook” 🙂
This is so helpful. It is always the little things that make such a big difference. I am pulling out a note book now and starting the deliberate planning you have done here. Thank you! I have a 5month old SPOO. Super smart, independent and confident. He usually sticks by me when i sit down but on occasion when i am sitting at my kitchen table he gets rambunctious with the other two 3 year old dogs. Should i stop him from doing that or should i let him play freely.
Really useful blog which madE me think in a more structured way about my young dog’s training. Many thanks.
Thanks for sharing, and for the reminder that an 8 month old puppy needs life skills training and reasonable focus expectations! You are such a good motivator, thank you.
Thanks Susan…..planning made clear!! I always start out well, but get lost along the way. Making a month by month plan like you have shown will help keep me on track. Chip is 8 months old on the 3rd of this month’s and your tips have been a great help!
Thanks so much for sharing so candidly and giving us a real behind the scenes look. You continue to demystify the process for us. Where can i buy some of that drive of yours though?
Thank you. You have reminded me that my planning has got very sloppy – I just do it “in my head” week by week and fit things in around all the classes and events where I train other people’s dogs – which is absolutely why my 3 year old collie is now sloppy in some of his skills. That will change from NOW! Thanks again.
Thank you for sharing Susan! “I” have learned so much from your videos and books it has made me a better trainer and my pup a better student. I can see where I am training correctly and I can see my mistakes and how I can correct them. My high-drive(very much like Buzz) 5 month old Border Collie understands over 25 commands and now I am polishing the ones that need it. Her recall is 95% good. I do not take credit for this…all the credit goes to you!!! Thank you, thank you! I appreciate this video on planning…I needed some positive reinforcement and YOU gave it to me. Another big thank you!
Thank you so much, Susan! I am so excited about starting foundations with my new addition in 4 weeks. All I have learned from you with my Snap, I will get to use with Puff. I love this monthly planning. I have never had a puppy at 11 weeks, always have been earlier. Part of me is anxious I’m missing out on early Say Yes! foundations. But I didn’t start Say Yes! with Snap until she was 11 months, so I know it will be okay.
Thank you again…
Thanks Susan….I am not a good planner so this has really helped.
Proving once again, you really are willing to share everything with us.
Thanks Susan, great blog!
Thank you very inspiring
Thanking for sharing with us
Excellent! Thank you once again Susan 🙂
Absolutely brilliant post 🙂
Very cool planning video! Thanks for sharing,just such info for us begins to make training log
One of your best posts Susan!
Thanks for sharing this!
Thanks Patty!
SO nice to see “really appropriate” puppy training. It is just not valued enough in this age of “go fast fast fast” at the expense of all else. SO thankful that you have influenced my dog training since 1999 and that interestingly, much of it has stayed the same. Looking forward to seeing more of Miss M as she grows up!
Priceless post! I will join you in being grateful to Momentum for motivating you to bring clarity to the rest of us 🙂
I so appreciated your comment on why Feature didn’t make the “recall off other dogs list.” That is an incredible tip.
Very cool planning video! Thanks for sharing.