All that obedience training put to good use

When you first go to puppy training class, the instructor focuses on the basics: sit, down, stand, come, watch.  As you get better at these, they add in wait, go place, relax, heel.  If you are lucky, your instructor will spend some time telling you real life scenarios in which each of these commands can be used and why you really need to be able to get and keep your dog's attention.

So you go home each week and practice in your house, in your yard, on your daily walks.  Or do you?  Well, I don't know how it works for others but this is how it appears to be working out for me.

Ivan is a small dog, incredibly cute, yes, but small.  And we all know a small dog somewhere that yaps, or pees inappropriately, or chews on peoples heels, or what ever.  I even know some big ones that do that but that is a different matter.  I did not want to own "that dog."  You know the one I mean.

So Ivan and I did practice our obedience class lessons every day.  And I thought we were making progress. At home I could get Ivan to sit, stand, down, wait to go through doors, wait to get in and out of the car.  On and off the leash.  That is progress, right?  And even if we left home, we still had a pretty high correct rate.  Then came a series of moments of truth.  First, Ivan ignored my sit, wait and come commands to run across the street to greet my neighbor.  Luckily, there were no cars coming but still:  nightmare images of squashed puppy still haunt my dreams.

Later that week, Ivan ignored my command to wait and bounced out of the car behind me right into the street and this time there was traffic.  i just about swallowed my heart.  Was this a stage in Ivan's development?  Was this teenage rebellion?  Well, no.  I thought about it long and hard and went over all the class materials and decided it was my fault.  The key to good behavior is consistency.  Consistent expectations with consistent responses will result in consistent behavior.  I was letting things slip.  I was not asking for the same behavior each time we got out of the car, therefore, I did not get the same behavior.

The good news is that I did not slip far and Ivan and I are back on the program.  Safety first, squirrels second.