As has been discussed, we start the process of teaching the down/stay by reinforcing staying down for less than a second. Initially, the trainer should remain close to the puppy without movement and the work should be in an environment with virtually no distractions. When the puppy no longer needs rapid reinforcements and can remain in the down without popping up consistently for at least 8-10 reward events in a row, it’s time to increase criteria.
There are three aspects of any stay exercise where criteria needs to be gradually and systematically increased in order to move a puppy forward in training. These aspects are time, distance, and distraction-level.
Guidelines for Increasing Criteria
- Criteria should be increased in only one aspect (time, distance, or distraction-level) at a time.
- It should be increased at a rate that is slow enough to keep the puppy successful. Your goal should be a 100% success rate, but realize that this is impossible. Your puppy will make mistakes and you will make mistakes by asking for too much.
- Criteria should be increased gradually without sudden large increases in criteria, even if the puppy appears to be successful.
- Criteria should be decreased when the puppy fails.
- Criteria should sometimes be reduced in one aspect when increasing the criteria in another aspect that is especially difficult for a particular puppy.
We start increasing the time almost at the very start of training the down/stay, though it is very subtle and gradual. We will often go from using our Rapid Rewards technique to waiting a full second before marking in the same training session.
Step 1 – Increase the Time
When your puppy no longer needs rapid reinforcements and is giving eye contact in the down position, it’s time to increase the length of time the puppy gives eye contact before giving the mark and the reward. Gradually increase the time (by milliseconds, not full seconds) until the puppy will consistently stay in the down position giving good eye contact for at least a full second, preferably a full two seconds.
Step 2 – Increase the Distance
Once your puppy is proficient at waiting in a down position with solid eye contact for between one and two seconds, it’s time to start moving your feet. Move your feet taking very small steps (just a few inches) back and forth. Gradually you’ll turn that slight movement of your feet into a single full step back from the puppy and then immediately taking a full step back to your puppy. Pause for a second. Mark and reward as long as the puppy remains in the down.
If the puppy gets up when first learning the down/stay, signal your puppy to get into the down again. Mark and reward for getting in the down and then try moving your feet without backing away as far. Mark and reward success.
Step 3 – Increase the Time Some More
Once your puppy is consistently staying still while you step back one step without a pause, and then returning, it’s time to increase the time again. Try pausing for a full second after stepping back one full step. Return. Pause for one second again while you are directly in front of your puppy. Mark and reward.
This pause after returning to your puppy is very important. Without it, many puppies will start anticipating the reward as soon as you’ve returned rather than waiting for the sound of the marker. Then, gradually that anticipation will begin before you’re returned while you are still on the way back to your puppy. It is super important for puppies to learn early in the learning process not to anticipate a release and that they must actively listen for the sound of the marker.
Step 4 – Take a Break from Your Stay Work in Order to Teach the Basics of Moving at Heel
It is important that you begin your heeling work before your puppy becomes so good at learning to stay that it gets ingrained in his mind that he is to never move when working to earn reinforcements.
This is a good place to temporarily put the work of staying still on hold while you teach your dog that there are times that he needs to move in order to earn reward. Therefore, we suggest that you take a break from teaching your dog to stay at this point until you teach your dog the basics of heeling on the fence. These skills are taught in skill chapters 9 & 10. Learn these skills and then you will be ready to go back to working on the down/stay again.
Step 5 – Combine Your Stay Work With Your Moving Work
The stay exercises and moving exercises are what we call conflicting exercises. They need to be taught separately and then merged together in a particular manner. See Chapter 10 for specific instructions on how to combine them together.
Step 6 – Move Your Work to the Place Cot
Many (if not most) very young puppies will tend to crawl forward towards the trainer as the trainer backs away from them. This problem is best remedied by having the puppy work on a raised surface such as a place cot. Details on how to use the place cot are in our Skill Chapter 11: The Place Cot.
Step 7 – Increase the Distractions and Generalize the Behavior
We begin working with our puppies outside about a week later where there are many many distractions. Eventually, we move the work off our property, onto the side of the street, and later into stores. We work around all kinds of people and around as many different new, and mildly scary things we can think of.
Step 8 – Proof Understanding of the Marker
At this point in training, the puppy should have a pretty good understanding of the fact that the food never comes until after the sound of the marker. We’re going to go over a technique that will proof your puppy’s understanding of this concept. We don’t use this technique until the puppy has a pretty decent understanding of the concept of the marker. It will confuse the puppy if used too soon. If used at the appropriate time, it will increase the puppy’s understanding that he must focus on the work that will bring the food instead of on the food itself.
It is important that we proof the marker at this point in our training to clarify the importance of listening for the marker. There could be some confusion as to the role of the marker because of our use of training tools that encourage focus on food. Luring encourages food focus and so does our rapid rewards process. When either of these techniques were used, the puppy has most likely ignored the marker. These food focused techniques were necessary for the short term, but to some extent these techniques might have added some confusion when it comes to whether or not the puppy should be thinking about the food or the work.
We should now be to the point in our training where these food focused techniques will be used only seldomly. Most importantly for now, we should not need these food focused techniques at all with regard to the down/stay exercise. Therefore, it’s time to really solidify in the minds of our puppies that they must be listening for the marker rather than focusing on the food.
We’ll do that by putting our puppies in a position of having to make a choice between listening for the sound of the marker or watching for us to reach for the food.
Here is how you do it. Just before you would normally mark and reward the puppy, hold your hands out to the side. Lean forward a bit towards the puppy as if you were about to give the puppy his food. If the puppy doesn’t move and maintains eye contact, mark and reward. While feeding with one hand, pull food out of your pouch with the other so that you can repeat the exercise with food in the opposite hand. Repeat this several times, each time increasing how close you are getting to the puppy with the food until you are holding the food right next to the puppy’s face.
When your puppy is consistently maintaining eye contact while you hold the food close to his face, repeat the exercise several times alternating hands. Make sure you don’t block the puppy’s view of you. He needs to be able to continue making eye contact. Don’t say the marker word until the puppy is ignoring the food and maintaining eye contact with you.
After the puppy takes his food each time, continue bending over. Put your other hand which should now have food in it close to the other side of his face. Wait until the puppy looks away from the food and gives eye contact. Mark and reward and load your opposite hand with food. Alternate the hand that is presenting the food at the side of your puppy’s face. Don’t give the food to your puppy until after you’ve said the marker word. Do this repeatedly.
Occasionally do this process of withholding the food while you give what might appear to be physical clues that the food is coming. These clues include your reaching for the food or bending down towards the puppy. The goal is a puppy that is so attuned to listening for the sound of the marker that he ignores any physical movement that might indicate the food is coming. This will solidify in your puppy’s mind that there is no point in focusing on the food or even on your handling of the food. We want the puppy’s full attention to be on listening for the marker word and doing the work that will earn it. This is what will build value in the marker and facilitate the transfer of value from the food to the marker and eventually to the work itself. This process will help your puppy to gain a very solid understanding of the fact that there is no need in looking at or even thinking about the food until after he hears the marker word. Once he understands this concept, his love of the sound of the marker will grow along with his love of the work!
Step 9 – Adding a Verbal to the Down/Stay
We do not add a verbal “stay” to our down/stay. We teach our dogs that they are to perform a behavior until either they are released from doing the behavior or we give them another behavior to perform. So when we tell them to “down”, there is an implied “stay” that goes along with it. We never want our dogs to go into a “down” just to pop back up. We always want them to stay there until we release them.
Our release cue is “okay”. Some people use “break”. Use any cue you like as long as you convey to the dog that when they hear it, they are released from work. A release differs from a marker such as “yes” in that a marker will always be followed by a primary reinforcer such as food or toy. When we say “okay”, there is no food or toy reward. “Okay” simply tells the dog that he is finished working.
How to Handle Errors in the Down/Stay
As has been mentioned, when a puppy that is new to this work gets up during the down/stay, you’ll simply repeat the exercise with reduced criteria. However, once a dog is proficient at getting into the down and fully understands the “down” cue, you’ll need to handle errors differently.
Do not reward the puppy for simply getting back into the down when he gets up for the stay portion of the exercise. He must do more at this stage of training. If a puppy who fully understands that he is being asked to remain in the down fails on the stay portion of the down/stay, he needs to repeat the stay portion before getting his reward.
When a puppy gets up when you back away from them, take them back to the place where they should have stayed. Tell them to “down”. You will no longer reward simply for getting back in the down. Instead, repeat the stay exercise at the level that you know the puppy can easily be successful. Ideally, back away one small step [It depends on how far along you are and how much the dog is wanting to pop up. For some it might mean that you need to just wait a second after the down then reward without moving back.
How does this look, Jenna?] and return. Then mark and reward if the puppy stays in the down. If you don’t think your puppy is able to maintain the down for even the smallest of your steps away from him, simply wait a full second in place before marking and rewarding.
The puppy needs to repeat the portion of the exercise that he failed before getting his reward. In this case, he failed the stay portion of the down/stay and therefore reinforcement must be for staying still.
Otherwise, puppies that don’t like to stay still will tend to pop up, just to go back down for their reward. These puppies are trying to change the game on you from a “stay” game to a get up and get back down game. You as the trainer should always choose the behavior you are asking for. The puppy gets to choose if he wants to work. However, if he chooses to work, the trainer chooses what work is being done.
When a dog fails to stay in a stay, criteria does need to be reduced. Don’t step away as far as you did when the puppy failed.
