Word Commands in Training

I've learnt the hard way, and from personal experience that 8/10 dog owners inevitably speak to their dogs in human terms, and expect their dogs to understand the grammar, vocabulary and meaning of what they are saying. We forget, ultimately, that dogs don't understand language, what they do understand is a series of frequently repeated sounds that they come to associate with an action or event. The intelligence of dogs to be able to learn many different sounds is a double-edged sword, they make us forget that we didn't actually cross the barrier of understanding of language, we merely pretended that we did. After all, isn't language just a frequently and widely used set of associations with events, objects and actions? Perhaps it's not that insane to think we might extend this language to dogs as well.

Be very careful what you say...
The main problem is that the words we (humans) are usually taught to use with dogs can sometimes work against us. Take this key example, I was taught to use "Come" to have my dog drop everything that they're doing and move towards me to get a treat. Inevitably, the word "come" was the first thing in my mind when I wanted my dog to be near me for anything, be it a treat, food, a hair cut or a nail clip. Not all of those events were actually events that my dog wanted to be near me for, however. Still helpful however, for my dog to learn to drop everything and come to me, though - except that the association with the word "come" has been tainted by the not-so-nice nail clips.

I ended up teaching (accidentally) my dogs to break up their play and "Finish" to come to me for a treat. This was done by me deciding at random intervals that they've had enough play, I said "Finish" and walked to the food bowl to dispense a treat. Very quickly they realised that whenever that word was uttered, however softly or gently, the food bowl was about to dispense something good. Needless to say, when they heard this word, they dropped whatever they were doing and ran to me to get a treat. I'd accidentally taught them the meaning of "come" but with the word "finish".

I have to now decide before even getting a dog the words I'm going to use, and what they mean and most importantly, stick to them. At the moment, I'm leaning towards words that I don't frequently use in normal speech, just to avoid the mix-up in meanings. At the same time, I have to have a clear hand gesture associated with them - vital for deaf dogs, but actually essential to avoid audio mix-up too. You soon find dogs respond to the hand signals more, regardless of what you say to them.

So the list is:

• Sit. Meaning: Put your bum on the ground. Hand Signal: Two fingers to thumb, brought upwards towards the face.
• Down. Meaning: Lie down. Hand Signal: Ideally pointing downwards (so that you can command a down while standing up) but my dogs ended up learning this as a downward facing palm moving down to the floor.
• Heel. Meaning: Stay close to my heel when walking and on a loose lead. Hand Signal: Slapping side of thigh to indicate staying close to my leg.
• Paw. Meaning: Shake paw, give me your paw. Hand Signal: Upward facing palm at dog-face level to shake the paw. Left palm for right paw, right paw for left palm.
• Beg. Meaning: Sit pretty, or sit back on your haunches with two front paws relaxed and folded in front. Hand Signal: Latest trick I've learnt, so not perfected yet. Come-hither signal with index finger upwards. (Because it's funny but also because one of only hand gestures that allow you to hold a treat and do at the same time.)
• Chill. Meaning: Lie down and take a break and relax. Good words to use would also be, "relax", "take 5", "kit kat". Some people call this "Settle" but I find "Chill" easier to learn because it's a single word, and also because one inevitably says "Settle Down" which is confusing. Hand Signal: Not much needs to be done with this actually, so I sweep the downward facing palm (for the down) across to the side, like a tai-chi movement.
• Spin. Meaning: Turn in a circle, at the moment, any direction is fine. This apparently is a great way for your dogs to clean their feet on the rug, but I have something else in mind. Hand Signal: Index finger in a counter/clock-wise direction.
• Speak. Meaning: Bark. Hand Signal: Next to your mouth, open and close hands.
• Silent/Shhh. Meaning: Stop barking, keep quiet. Hand Signal: Finger on lips. Don't say anything. This is a great one to teach the kids.
• Kick it. Meaning: Kick your front and back paws (usually on a rug). This helps your dogs to remove most of the mud from their paws before the end of a walk. One of my dogs does this anyway after a pooh, so wasn't that hard to teach. Hand Signal: Index and Third Finger in a walking movement.