The Right Age to Start Training? by TD Yandt originally published at pupforum.com on August 5, 2005
I have an (approx.) 13 week old female American Pit Bull Terrier puppy that I have had since she was (approx) 8 weeks old. She is a rescue. She is a very sweet tempered pup, very willing and eager to please. She is extremely intelligent and therein lies my problem.
I started teaching her the "Sit" command a couple days after I got her just using her dog food and praise. It took about 3 days of doing that once a day for about 10 minutes and she had learned to sit 9 times out of 10. At that time I started searching the Internet for training information because I didn't want to make any huge mistakes. Then I went ahead and made the mistake of listening to what a couple trainers said on some websites (and a training video I borrowed) that she was too young to start obedience training. I stopped training her and just had her 'Sit" everyone once in a while so she wouldn't forget. According to those sources I shouldn't start training until she is at least 5-6 months of age.
Well I finally decided that was simply too long to wait to start training her, especially since she's growing so fast, and began training again yesterday. She will sit about 7 times out of 10 if she's distracted slightly, and 10 out of 10 if she's not distracted. That is great for me right now, however, I don't really know where to go from here. I don't know if I should just continue teaching her to be 100% solid on "Sit" all the time and nothing else, or begin adding another basic command once she's gotten the hang of the one she's currently working on. (I.e. begin teaching her the "Down" command now that she knows how to sit)
Also, is she too young for a corrective collar? I would like to start teaching her the "Come" command as soon as possible as well, as this is becoming a problem. In doing so do I use simply her regular collar and when I say "Come" just drag her towards me? I can't exactly sit and wait for her to figure out what I want...yet on the other hand I can't really see using a corrective collar because she wouldn't know what I was correcting her for at that point. You can get a lot of information about dog training on the Internet and from videos and books. However, not a single one of them covers what to do when you have an extremely intelligent and quick learner and you need to move through things either faster, or do things differently.
Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thank you! Trish in Texas (PyroNeko, Texas )
Thanks for your questions Trish. Congratulations on your new puppy! You are in for a lot of work, and many years of love and loyalty. Good on you for deciding to adopt a rescue. Bullies are fabulous dogs, very smart and fun to be around – but you are right, they need to start training pretty young or soon you’ll have a big dog who’s difficult to for you to handle.
The debate on what age to begin puppy training has been around as long as the domestic dog has shared our homes and lives. Compulsion based training methods say wait. Because of the physical nature of traditional training you stand to injure, or break the spirit of, a young pup. Thankfully forced based training is slowly being left behind for a more humane methodology…
Affection training, Operant Conditioning, Clicker training… all allow for very early training that will last a life time. With gentle canine-centric learning there is no reason to wait until the magic six months of age. Studies have proven that the younger you begin your training the more effective it can be. Young pups are truly knowledge sponges just waiting to soak up everything you throw at them (both good and bad).
You want to ensure you have a good solid hold on all the basics before you hit the second fear period, which occurs at about six months of age. This is also when your pup is entering adolescence. Waiting until this age to begin any type of training can set you both up for disappointment and outright disaster. Pups in their adolescence are just like human adolescence – they will try your patience. Already having a good foundation will save you both from a lot of headache and frustration.
I recommend reading my previous column on clicker training for beginners. Follow that up with a couple of great books on the subject. Check out Karen Prior’s Don’t Shoot the Dog and Melissa Alexander’s Click for Joy! They are sure to get you started on the right path.
As for your question on when to begin using a corrective collar… Don’t. There really is no reason to. It’s much better to train with an eye on the positive instead of looking for the negative. You and your pup will be much happier without using physical aversives.
