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Hi, we always have the owners work on the training themselves in our group classes. We are just there to supervise and help. Just like the people here on the site most people do this training themselves with our guidance. The best way to train a dog is to do it with your own. If its done in a way that we teach with the starmak, this is a very safe tool. You can learn about the starmark through the videos. We usually teach leash manners first. This is safe for the dogs and you can see howbwe do it in the video. We are never forceful to the dogs and always teach them the behavior we want first through positive reinforcement. When the dog knows say ..sit or down without body language and then you are able to get interal rewards in you can start thinning out the rewars and see in you can get a little duration out of it.. then when you can build a duration and the dog does this without body language you can move on to phase 2 for that particular command. In phase to its easier for the dog to learn by getting them into position first then only correcting them for breaking taht position. So say if you hot the dog into a sit….you then only give a little leash pump straight up and calmly repeat sit…the dog will soon figure out how to “escape” the correction… (by sitting) and then you praise the dog give reward and free it up. Short little sessions again until you can build a duration. There is a checklist of steps on the site so as long as you follow all the steps on the checklist for each phase you arent going to do anything but help the dog learn. Foundation style training is designed to do things layer by layer step by step to cause the least amount of stress to the dogs because we are teaching them. I think if you follow this you will be fine and so will they. In fact if you follow step by step with our guidance i know you will. Remember we will be here to help you and to trouble shoot. The training will of course always be easier if the foundation is in place first. Good leadership, a good attitude, patience…once you start doing it..youll see how easy it can be.
