Imagine for a moment that you are learning a new task. Your teacher has given you little or no direction, or at least not anything that was clear, and your both sitting at a table with several objects in front of you that youll need to use for this task. Now, if you sit still without interacting with the objects for too long your teacher corrects you. It doesnt really matter how, yelling, a slap on the wrists, spraying you with water, etc. Of course you dont like that so you try something else, but each time you do something that your teacher doesnt want you to do, say picking the objects up out of order, or holding them wrong, or putting the wrong ones together, or looking away from the objects, or taking a deep breath, or standing instead of sitting (you get the idea) you get corrected again. Doesnt sound like fun, and how long would it take you to learn what youre supposed to do, if you even get that far, most of us would choose to leave such a situation given the option.
Now think about your dog, he doesnt speak English, he cant read your mind, your body language can be confusing, and he cant read. How will he learn from you? Well, you could watch for every little thing that he does wrong, and correct him each time, or you could use a simple system of communication (think click/treat = good things happen so I should keep doing this) to teach him what you want him to do.
Training your dog should be about teaching him how youd like them to behave. If you focus on rewarding the good stuff and simply removing the rewards for the not so good stuff, it will go a long way toward building an amazing relationship and bond between you and your dog. Just remember, if youre always correcting behaviors you dont like, are you really training your dog or just hurting the bond you share?
