DunbarAcademy.com

Your dog cannot listen to what you say, or see what you signal, if they’re not paying attention. As a result, specifically teaching your dog to Watch and Pay Attention will hugely improve their response reliability. It’s easiest to start by using Wait & Reward Training to teach your dog to watch you. Simply hang out with your dog in a safe, secure environment, stand still and wait until your dog looks at you. When they do,… say, “Good Dog” and offer a piece of kibble. Today, this is how your dog is going to eat their entire dinner.

It doesn’t matter how distracting the environment, whether you’re both in the kitchen, or sitting outside of a dog park with people and dogs everywhere. And it doesn’t matter how long it takes for your dog to look at you, or how short their first glance is. When your dog looks at you, even for a split second, immediately praise, “Good Dog” and offer a food reward.

Once you capture the first couple of glances, you'll find your dog looks at you more frequently and for longer stretches of time. Relish the attention and praise your dog. Then, turn your back on your dog and wait. Now, you are challenging your dog to Find your Face. Your dog has to come round to your front to make eye-contact. Many dogs will also sit, to make it easier for them to look up to meet your gaze. Wait until they sit and look at your face then praise and reward. Then turn your back on them again and wait until your dog comes to your front and Sit-Stays and Looks at You again. Keep repeating this exercise until your dog learns to immediately come to your front, Sit-Stay and look at you, as soon as you turn away from them. 

During the first few trials, Wait & Reward Training may take a little time but the technique soon produces amazing results and it always works. Once your dog is in the habit of watching you, it’s time to put “Pay Attention” on cue.

We don’t actually bother to use the words “Pay Attention” or “Watch Me” because the meaning is embedded in your dog’s Name. If you think about it, when you say “Rover”, it’s actually an instruction that means that Rover should now pay attention to the person who said “Rover”, and then comply with any further verbal instructions or hand signals that person gives.

Using your dog’s name before every verbal command and/or hand signal is especially important if you live with more than one dog, or other people. Your dog quickly learns that they may ignore what you say to other dogs, or people, (or yourself) but they must respond promptly whenever you say their name. Thus, your dog can relax for most of the time and only needs to reactivate their brain and body when you say, “Rover”. 

And actually, it’s a good idea to use two names for your dog, one formal name that indicates that you want your dog to comply immediately and a nickname that indicates that the command is really more of a suggestion, and if your dog doesn’t feel like doing it, they don’t have to. 

This allows you to be relaxed and casual most of the time you spend with your dog, while still retaining the ability to summon high level reliability and compliance when you really need it. For more information on training with this two-name system, watch the Formal Name video in the previous section.