The Auto Sit

Sit is a great and simple behaviour but also it is incompatible with many problem behaviours such as jumping up, chasing and lunging forwards.

The auto sit is where the dog chooses to do the behaviour as opposed to us telling it. This uses a mindful approach where we can teach the dog to think about its normal instinctive responses and make a better choice. To make a good choice the dog needs to have a history of the particular behaviour being done through choice and getting a reward for that choice.

This is a foundation behaviour that we can use to train lots of great control in different situations

You can reward sits at home by just acknowledging it every time you see it. Your dog will then think human’s love sits and offer them to you when it wants something. This is learning to ‘ask’ nicely

It is good to build up a collection of offered behaviours in the dog and this can become its tool box of good choices. So if you see something you like, reward it. Remember what gets rewarded gets repeated.

You can start this exercise by asking for a sit and rewarding it about 5 times , then do not give an instruction and see if he dog decides to do it itself. If it does click and treat

 

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 Jane Ardern Bsc (Hons) Copyright 2019