One of the most important ingredients in designing a successful training program is selecting the right reward for your dog. In order to decide what reward to use, you have to observe your dog to see what motivates and excites them. It can be:
- praise
- touch
- food
- play
Or a combination of these. Couple things to keep in mind when rewarding your dog:
- Know the difference between Lures, Rewards and Bribes
- Phase out the rewards into an intermittent reinforcement schedule
- Have a variety of rewards, saving the most valuable for new and difficult tasks.
Pawesome info! Woooowooooo!
Great post!
Thanks for this. Our dog Rodrigo responds both to praise and food; our other dogs are mostly food motivated, but I give them a lot of praise too, because I don’t want them to get into the habit of only doing things,because I have food in my hand.
It’s quite the balancing act with our pack 🙂