Essential Skills for a Brilliant Family Dog Books 1-4

ESSENTIAL SKILLS FOR A BRILLIANT FAMILY DOG

BOOKS 1-4

BEVERLEY COURTNEY

CONTENTS

Books By The Author

Free Training for you!

Disclaimer

BOOK 1 CALM DOWN!

Introduction

1. Introducing the Mat!

What do you need?

Your Mat

Treats

Good treats

OK treats

Fairly rubbish treats

TROUBLESHOOTING

2. Starting with the Mat

Lesson 1

TROUBLESHOOTING

In this chapter we have established that:

3. Mat Magic!

Lesson 2

How do I get my dog to lie down?

Teaching her Down on the mat

Capture a Down

Lie down in a tunnel

Luring into a Down

TROUBLESHOOTING

Lesson 3

TROUBLESHOOTING

In this chapter we have established that:

4. What do I do with this mat now?

Coffee with a friend, or Sunday lunch at the pub

A peaceful evening in the living room

Visiting the vet

Family picnic

In this chapter we have learnt that:

5. Taking it on the road

The doorbell!

Targets

Preparing dinner

Mat substitutes

Reports from the Front Line

In this chapter we have established that:

6. Surprise benefits of Mat Magic!

How should our day go?

In this chapter we have established that:

Conclusion

Resources

BOOK 2 LEAVE IT!

Introduction

1. It’s all about choice

Choices, choices

Special equipment you’ll need to teach Impulse Control

Equipment you do NOT want to use

How to reward your dog for her brilliant self-control

In this chapter we have established:

2. Introducing the Magic Hand

Lesson 1 Teaching the Magic Hand Game

TROUBLESHOOTING

How will this help with everyday grabbing and stealing?

Life becomes simpler

In this chapter we have established:

3. Keeping away from dropped or found food on the ground

Lesson 2 Teaching the Food-on-the-Floor Game, or Magic Hand 2.0

TROUBLESHOOTING

Lesson 3 Bringing the game to real life!

An important word about words

Lesson 4 Adding the cue

TROUBLESHOOTING

Lacy’s Find

In this chapter we have established:

4. Why does it work?

People first

Pavlov’s Dogs and Classical Conditioning

How does this apply to us?

Operant Conditioning

Why does this matter to me and my pet dog?

A word about punishment

In this chapter you’ve learnt that:

5. Here comes the joy!

1. The Door

2. The Car Door

3. The Crate

Furniture

5. Toy Play

6. Reclaiming Stolen Shoes

7. Mugging Your Hand or Your Pocket for Those Treats

8. Tasty Shopping Bags in the Car

9. Helping Tidy Up the Kitchen (aka Countersurfing)

10. Marking Every Tree

11. Passing Quietly By Previously Exciting Things

12. Meet and Greet Nicely

The Premack Principle

In this chapter we have established that:

6. The effect of Impulse Control on the two of you

What effect will this have on my dog?

So how will all this affect me?

Mutual trust

Side effects

That’s mine!

It’s all tricks to them

Food on The Paws

Food on the Head

The Famous Tossing the Biscuit off the Nose Trick

In this chapter we have established that:

Conclusion

Resources

BOOK 3 LET’S GO!

Introduction

7. Equipment that will help you … and equipment to avoid like the plague

So if it’s so bad, why on earth do dogs do it?

But my dog is big and strong!

Collars

The Collar Hold

Harness

Head Halters

Leads

Devices used by the Inquisition

What’s a clicker and do I have to use one?

Treats

TROUBLESHOOTING

In this chapter we have discovered:

8. Change your mindset first

Holding the lead

You never have to pull your dog’s lead again!

Key Lead Skill No.1 Holding the Lead

What you accept is what you get

Time to keep still

Key Lead Skill No.2 Parking

TROUBLESHOOTING

We’ve hardly begun and you have learnt

9. If she’s not out front, where should she be?

Lesson 1: Teaching your dog to find the Reward Spot

Your first tentative steps

Lesson 2: Reward Spot on the Move

TROUBLESHOOTING

In this chapter we have learnt

10. Keeping those hands soft at all times

Key Lead Skill No. 3 Slow Stop

TROUBLESHOOTING

Key Lead Skill No. 4 Lead Stroking

TROUBLESHOOTING

The very beginnings of your companionable walk

TROUBLESHOOTING

In this chapter we’ve learnt

11. Get moving!

1 2 3 Treat!

Lesson 3: Checking in

TROUBLESHOOTING

Let’s take this on the road

More advanced stuff

Really advanced stuff

Lesson 4: Moving past distractions

This is what your dog has now learnt:

12. Complications?

My dog’s friendly!

In this chapter you’ve learnt:

Conclusion

Resources

BOOK 4 HERE BOY!

Introduction

13. What you need to have and know to get success

Treats: what and why?

Control the rewards and you control the dog

What the stylish well-behaved dog is wearing

Collar

Harness

Lead

Tag line

Long Line

In this chapter you’ve learnt:

14. What is a recall?

Your brand new puppy

Call just once

Name versus sound

Lesson 3: The Precious Name Game

Speed, joy, and enthusiasm

Follow through

Puppy vs. mature dog vs. new rescue dog

Pavlov (not the creamy meringue dessert, but the scientist)

Dogs do what works

9 Rules for the Perfect Recall

In this chapter you’ve learnt:

15. Now the fun starts!

Learning to pay attention

Lesson 1: The Focus Game

Lesson 2: The Name Game

TROUBLESHOOTING

Taking the Name Game on the road

TROUBLESHOOTING

In this chapter you’ve learnt:

16. Four more classic recall games

Lesson 3: The Running Name Game

TROUBLESHOOTING

Lesson 4: Puppy Pingpong

TROUBLESHOOTING

Lesson 5: Cannonball Recall

TROUBLESHOOTING

Lesson 6: Torpedo Recall

TROUBLESHOOTING

Distractions and Distance

In this chapter we’ve learnt:

17. Taking it outside - rabbits and other beasts

Those squirrels!

In this chapter you’ve learnt:

Conclusion

Resources

Appreciation

Free Training for you!

About the Author

Copyright © 2016 Beverley Courtney Ltd

The right of Beverley Courtney to be identified as the author of the work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or otherwise, without written permission from the author.

Second edition: 2023

www.brilliantfamilydog.com

BOOKS BY THE AUTHOR

Essential Skills for a Brilliant Family Dog

Book 1 Calm Down! Step-by-Step to a Calm, Relaxed, and Brilliant Family Dog

Book 2 Leave it! How to teach Amazing Impulse Control to your Brilliant Family Dog

Book 3 Let’s Go! Enjoy Companionable Walks with your Brilliant Family Dog

Book 4 Here Boy! Step-by-step to a Stunning Recall from your Brilliant Family Dog

Essential Skills for your Growly but Brilliant Family Dog

Book 1 Why is my Dog so Growly? Teach your fearful, aggressive, or reactive dog confidence through understanding

Book 2 Change for your Growly Dog! Action steps to build confidence in your fearful, aggressive, or reactive dog

Book 3 Calm walks with your Growly Dog Strategies and techniques for your fearful, aggressive, or reactive dog

New Puppy: From New Puppy to Brilliant Family Dog

New Puppy! Biting? No sleep? Puddles?

How to survive the early weeks and still love your puppy!

Fetch It!: More skills for a Brilliant Family Dog

Teach your Brilliant Family Dog to catch, fetch, retrieve, find, and bring things back!

FREE TRAINING FOR YOU!

Get the next piece of the puzzle

Jumping up?

Barking?

Chewing?

Get inventive solutions to everyday problems with your dog with our free email course at

https://brilliant-family-dog.ck.page/bfd-ecourse

DISCLAIMER

I have made every effort to make my teachings crystal clear, but we’re dealing with live animals here (That’s you, and your dog.) and I can’t see whether you’re doing it exactly right. I am unable to guarantee success, as it depends entirely on the person utilising the training programs, strategies, tools, and resources.

What I do know is that this system works!

Nothing in these books should upset or worry your dog in any way, but if your dog has a pre-existing problem of fear or aggression you should consult a force-free trainer to help. www.brilliantfamilydog. com/growly will get you started.

By the way, to simplify matters I refer to our trainee dog throughout this series as she. He and she will both learn the exact same way. The cumbersome alternatives of he/she or they depersonalise our learner: I want her to be very real to you!

All the photos in this book are of real dogs – either my own, or those of students and readers (with their permission). So the reproduction quality is sometimes not the best. I have chosen the images carefully to illustrate the concepts – so we’ll have to put up with some fuzziness.

BOOK 1 CALM DOWN!

Step-by-step to a calm, relaxed, and

Brilliant Family Dog

ESSENTIAL SKILLS FOR A BRILLIANT FAMILY DOG

Book 1

BEVERLEY COURTNEY

INTRODUCTION

Coco (15 weeks) says, If this thing is on the ground, I must need to sit on it.

Time for a change

You, your dog and your family have had a great outing, seeing the sights of the seaside town - the beach, the castle, the ramparts, the quaint streets, and the shops. You all are now exhausted and need to stop for coffee and cakes, fizz and crisps - the perfect finish to a family day out. But your dog is having none of it! You’d think she’d be worn out by now with all that tramping along cobbled streets, the run on the beach, splashing in the waves, clambering up stone steps, rolling in that dead fish …

Possibly it’s because she’s tired that she’s being so difficult now. She won’t settle - she’s poking and pestering at hands and elbows, jogging your arm so your coffee sploshes on your lap. She’s whining and pacing. She’s begging for food. She doesn’t seem to know how to switch off.

Does this picture look familiar? What can you do about this other than nagging, tutting, and keeping her on a tight lead?

There’s a secret that a lot of family dog owners just don’t know - and I’m going to explain its mysteries to you here.

We all seek security and a place to belong, a place where we can relax and feel at ease. As soon as we’re in a strange place again, we get anxious and fidgety.

Witness how long it takes people to choose a table in even an almost empty cafe!

A fretful toddler can halt her tears and become calm just by clutching her security blanket or beloved teddy bear close to her. Your dog is just the same.

She needs to feel secure and safe in order to settle. She also needs to know that settling down is all she has to do right now.

Just before we start, let’s have a look at some of the situations where this technique I’m going to teach you can help. Do they resonate with you? Does your dog do any of these things? One or two of them may be major annoyances for you. There may be others that are minor irritations that you didn’t even know could be fixed!

You’ve managed to infiltrate a visitor into your house and your dog will not leave them alone! Now your guest is giving you a stiff smile from behind a flurry of paws and tail, assuring you they don’t mind - all the time wishing they hadn’t come.

You want to settle down for a picnic during a day out and your dog is trampling over the blanket, treading in the food, stealing the sandwiches … You can’t relax and enjoy some quiet time with your family.

You open the car door and your dog comes flying out to play an infuriating chase game around the car, leap up at a passing pensioner, or - tragically - run into the road.

You’re trying to help the children get their homework done while also organising their meal, but your dog continually interrupts proceedings by trying to steal the food you’re making and disturbing the children. You’ve tried putting her in the garden, but she just barks and digs up the flowerbeds.

You’ve had a nice family walk with your dog. You need to get everyone loaded back in the car with all their toys, bikes, and stuff. Your dog decides to play a game of Keep Away. She won’t come to have her feet dried and get into the car.

You’re at the vets and your dog is straining on the lead, trying to get at the cat in its basket, jumping up at anyone who walks past, making you feel quite inadequate at being able to control her.

Your dog never stops. She goes on and on and on. She doesn’t rest - in fact, she seems to get more frantic, busy, and difficult as the day goes on. She totally resists the vital restorative sleep you know she needs.

You find yourself thinking, Whose idea was it to get a dog?

Recognise any of these? They are all common events in many homes, and they really add up to a lot of frustration and annoyance. You chose to get a family dog because of the pleasure and richness she’d bring to your lives, but when your dog is driving you mad on a daily basis, you wonder how it’s gone so wrong. That pleasure and richness can feel so far away.

It was having to learn the techniques to make a Brilliant Family Dog with my own busy household of multiple dogs, cats, sheep, goats, hens, and children that set me on the road to helping others do the same. I learnt early on that forcing someone to do something only resulted in grudging compliance at best; whereas getting them to participate and enjoy the process turned them into eager and fast learners. This applied equally to the dogs, the goats - and the children! The sheep and the cats not so much.

My qualifications range from the understanding of learning theory to specialist work for fearful, anxious, and growly dogs. Acquiring an anxious, growly dog of my own ensured that I learnt and understood the process of assimilating the dog into our world in a way which built her confidence.

There are some superb teachers and advocates of force-free dog training, and you’ll find those I am particularly indebted to in the Resources section at the end of this book. Some of the methods I’ll be showing you are well-known in the force-free dog training community, while many have my own particular twist.

My work revolves around puppies, new rescue dogs, growly dogs - and, of course, dog owners! There are many people more gifted than I who can train animals to do astonishing things. My gift lies in being able to convey my knowledge to the dog’s caregiver in a way which has them saying, It’s so obvious when you put it like that!

Dogs are individuals and so are their owners, so sometimes creativity and imagination are needed to solve a problem. There isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach to training - as you’ll see when you look at the Troubleshooting sections following each lesson in the book.

Here are some tips to keep in mind as you go through this book:

Keep sessions very, very short - ten treats may be plenty long enough

Keep treats flowing very fast whenever you’re teaching anything new

Remember that frustration and annoyance will not help anyone, so if things aren’t going well in your (very short) session, just call it a day, have a game with your dog, and try again later.

Move your training to different locations as you build up your dog’s love of this game. First of all, just a different room in the house.

If you focus on this as a project - having just one short session a day - you’ll be amazed how quickly you reach the stage of being able to use your new skills anywhere, any time.

Follow the steps that I outline for you. Don’t skip or jump ahead. Work on each step till it’s more or less right, then move on. There’s no need to be a perfectionist here. You don’t want to get stuck.

I suggest you read the whole book before you start so you yourself are clear about what you need and what you are aiming for. Then re-read the lesson you’re working on and go straight into your very short session. After this you can assess where you are and check the Troubleshooting section for any difficulties that are relevant to you and your dog. Then you’ll be ready for your next session the next day.

Just one skill is needed

You may be surprised to learn that all the pictures I painted before (and many more) can be completely resolved by one simple technique. You teach your dog to LOVE her mat - her security blanket - a place to find comfort and freedom from anxiety. Once she does, she will become putty in your hands.

And no! It’s not difficult to teach. Even young puppies in an exciting environment can learn this invaluable skill quickly.

Puppies from 16-20 weeks resting quietly on their mats before Puppy Class begins

Dogs are doers

They can’t exist in a vacuum. They need to be doing something. Teaching your dog to keep her mat on the floor by lying on top of it is the perfect solution to relieving anxiety and stress.

All you need is a small mat and a bit of teaching to make your dog feel secure and at home, even when she’s out. She’ll have a place she can rest and relax without worrying about where she is or what she should be doing.

In this book, I’ll show you how to get your dog manic about her mat. As soon as you put it down she will hurl herself onto it as if it might float away and escape if she’s not fast enough! She will stay firmly on her mat, anchoring it to the floor, and she will even stay there regardless of how many crumbs the children drop, until you are ready to release her.

The magical aspects of the mat are that it:

Acts like a toddler’s security blanket, making your dog feel comfortable and at ease

Creates a bubble for the dog to stay in safely while she observes the world, dispelling the anxiety she might otherwise feel

Builds a state of relaxation which becomes connected with the mat; i.e. dog on mat = snoozing dog

Is especially valuable with reactive or anxious dogs; they don’t have to be on guard duty the whole time

Keeps your dog content and amused when coupled with treats or a food-toy

Your dog thinks, I know what I should be doing, as she settles down

Are you ready to get started? Let’s go!

1

INTRODUCING THE MAT!

Cricket is watching with interest as this strange new mat floats down to the ground

So let’s get cracking.

There are some things you’re going to need to ensure success with these lessons, so I’ll introduce them to you now.

What do you need?

Your Mat