[YorkieTherapy]

Positive reinforement and treats worked for us in obedience training, but I found clicker training somewhat irritating in a class setting, and all those clickers going off at once can be confusing for some dogs. I've even seen a few shy dogs and their owners drop out of agility, the dog refusing to enter the building because they were so fearful of the sound, so I wouldn't recommend it for every dog. Having said that, I do use the clicker at home when teaching Guinness' complex tricks.

One thing I would like to share… young pups are more visual learners at first than they are verbal. In puppy class we are taught to say the command and combine it with giving a hand signals thinking they understand both, but do they?

We were in a advance class of twenty dogs one day, when the trainer stopped us midway and had everyone stand 3 feet in front of their dogs. People were told to put their hands in their pocket and instructed not to move any part of our body, the only thing we were allowed to to do was to talk. We cycled through the basic commands verbally- sit, down, stand follow by stay, come and finish. At the end of that exercise, we were told only 3 out of 20 dogs understood all verbal commands, that if you were standing behind your dog giving a verbal command, do not yell or get frustrated with your dog because he/she did not do what you've asked, because they can't see the hand signal behind them and don't understand you what you ask of them, that it is not their fault. People were stunned. It was a valuable learning experience.

I've always believe that dog training classes are really more for people and that we are responsible for what our dogs learn, bad or good. Be kind, positive and make it fun.