We did the same thing, but I found that the puppy class was too slow for Joey, he was pad trained and we didn't any help with that, so we took the tricks training class instead. I actually would rather Joey be around adult dogs than puppies, he got into most of his bad spots with a clumsy puppy. The trainer at Petsmart told me to take Joey to a dog park for socialization, and this was a bad idea. Most of the dogs were fine, but one puppy knocked him over, and all the other dogs trampled him. I found out that that trainer was in training. I would try and find out how much training your trainer has had. Sometimes I think socialization is best accomplished one on one, or a very controlled environment, I feel like what I did traumatized Joey instead of helping him. At least in the trick training class the other dogs were very well behaved. He has about 4 dogs friends now that come to the house to visit, and he's pretty good with other dogs now. We did love the trick training class though, that was a lot of fun, and you are right, they don't really train your dog, they train you to train him. |