What is the first thing you should train your dog?

There are sooooo many cool tricks, commands, sports, and more to train your dog, but before you get into any of that, we always recommend teaching what we in dog trainer land call Markers. 

Markers are short sounds that we use to give our dogs feedback on their decisions and behaviors. 

We call our Marker system: The Communication! Partially because we wanted to get a little fancy and fun with it! Partially because we feel that it is a better way to express the purpose of using these sounds. Once the pup and the human understand them well, we can use them to effectively “have a conversation” with our pupper to guide them in the right direction. That way instead of having to use commands all the time to keep our pups safe and to mind their manners, we can instead just tell them “Hey, that’s great, do that more often” or “Nope, don’t do that”. We can create strong boundaries, which ultimately allows more freedom since our dogs know what they can do and what they can’t. 

The Communication is four sounds: 

• Yes = You made the right choice, come to me for your reward! 
• No = You made the wrong choice and a consequence you don’t like is incoming. 
• Gooood = I like what you’re doing, keep on doing it! 
• Ah-ah = Your warning with a chance to make it right. 

 For our super advanced puppers, we’ll also use: 

• Break = You made the right choice, go get the reward away from me. Ex. throwing a ball or treat for them to pounce on. 
• Free = You’re freeeee within reason. (LOL) 

Why do we teach these first? Simple. We can’t teach our dog anything else without a clear way to give the dog feedback. Markers give us the ability to quickly “mark” a behavior and let our pup know if that is the correct or incorrect course of action. Once we can give clear feedback, we can teach em anything we want wayyyy more efficiently and effectively. 

A bit more lingo for you. There are a couple different types of markers, namely terminal markers and continuation markers. 

Terminal markers are sounds that mean that the dog can stop doing whatever we asked them to do. Our terminal markers in the Communication are “Yes” and “No”. Either way, the dog is free to move about momentarily, but generally we do expect that they re-engage with us, especially with a “No”. After a “No”, we always want to make sure we’re giving more information to our pup on how they can get it right the next time/what they should be doing instead of whatever mistake they made. An example with a “Yes” would be asking the dog to do a “Down”, they do the “Down”, we mark the “Yes”, and then they can stand up and grab the treat from the human.

Continuation markers are used when we want our dog to keep doing whatever they’re doing. In the Communication, “Good’ and “Ah-ah” would be considered continuation markers. For example, we ask the dog to do a “Place” command. They go to the bed and lay down, we can tell them “Goood” for doing what we asked. If they start to step off, we can give an “Ah-ah” to help them step back onto the bed and earn another “Good”/”Yes”. 

Markers don’t have to be verbal either! Many folks use Clickers as a marker for good choices. Clickers have their pros and cons. Big pro is that it is a unique sound that isn’t made during normal conversation, so it tends to keep its’ meaning super well. The downside is that you have to carry the thing around with you, while your voice is with you all the time, unless you’re having a snack and your mouth is full. The other downside to Clickers that is super personal to me is that I detest the Clicker sound…. It hits my ear drums in a really weird way and I don’t love it, so I don’t tend to use them very often even though I know they are super valuable! 

Can you get by without making sure your dog has a clear marker set, sure, but it will make your life 7000 times easier if they do.

Not sure where to start? We have options! 

If you’re a DIY type of person and want to work through this process at your own pace, our Basics Course Bundle is for you! You get our 5 week signature program, plus lifetime Community support along the way! Go to www.dogseyeviewtraining.com/devonline for info and to sign up! 

If you’re in the Detroit Metro Area and would like to work with us in person via Private Lessons, Day Train, or Board & Train, visit www.dogseyeviewtraining.com/start for info and to get started today! 

Or if you’re not local to us, we have a Virtual Coaching program as well! Email [email protected] to get started! 

Hope to hear from you soon! Happy training! 

-Kate <3