Petsmart Puppy Class Day 1

Tonight Molly went to her first puppy class at Petsmart! She did well in learning the tricks but not so well in socializing with the other puppies. I'm going to go into a lot of detail here--forgive me. I was just wishing I could have gone through someone's blog post on Petsmart training so I would know what to expect.

The first ten minutes of class were puppy play time. Our instructor Richard told us to drop the leashes and let the puppies just play together, since the only way they can learn to socialize with other dogs is by doing it. There are 6 or 7 puppies in the class. Most of them are big puppies--there's a husky, a bull mastiff, a chocolate lab, and a few other dogs I couldn't identify, plus a very yippy chihuahua. Most of the puppies eagerly started playing, but Molly hid behind my legs and even climbed up on my chair to sit in my lap. The instructor made me put her back down. We weren't allowed to touch the puppies during puppy play time, and if they hid behind us, we had to move.

It broke my heart to listen to him, because Molly was terrified! When I moved away, she hid under my chair. The bull mastiff (his name is Hulk, which is basically perfect) came over to sniff her, and she ran away whining in fear, tail between her legs, to hide behind another woman's legs across the room. Richard said if puppies are scared of dogs like that, it usually means they were taken from their litters too soon. I am a little unclear on Molly's age. The breeder's husband told me she was born on December 18, but her shot record says she was born on December 9. Either way, she got an extra 5 days with her family after her siblings left--so if anything, her litter was taken from her too soon! But she spent that time living with other adult dachshunds. I'm not sure the problem is that she was taken from her family too soon, or if it's just that she hasn't interacted with other dogs for the month that I've had her. Either way... Richard is hopeful that we can overcome her fear.

After puppy play time, we gathered up our dogs, and Richard taught us the secret to training dogs. The second they do something right, we've got to say, "YES!" in a bright and happy voice, so they learn that "yes" means they did something good. The timing of the "Yes" is more important than the timing of a treat when we are teaching them, because soon the treat goes away. He had us go around the room and each say, "Yes!" one by one. (He said I had the perfect tone. If he'd asked me to say "no," though, that wouldn't have gone well.) He threw a ball in the air and told us to say "Yes" as soon as it hit its highest point, so we could work on responding quickly. And then he bounced it off the ground and we had to say "Yes" as soon as it hit. Once we passed that test, he told us to get out our dog treats. Five times in a row, we said "Yes!" and then gave the dog a treat to get the positive association in their brains.

Then Richard walked around the circle. He'd distract each dog, and the owner's job was to call their name and give them a treat (with a big YES of course!) when the dog turned to look at them. (When we say the dog's name, it should mean "Stop what you are doing and look at me, a command is coming.") Molly rocked at this. The second I said her name, she turned to me. Richard said that was name recognition at a high level, and she'll do well.

Next, we worked on sit. Each owner had to run into the middle of the circle and stand in three different places, getting the dog to sit each time. Richard wasn't critiquing the dog's performance so much as the owner's performance, which made me a bit nervous, but it went well. The hardest part was coaxing Molly out of the corner to the middle of the circle. She is so scared of the other dogs! She looked up at me with this adorable scared puppy dog face that made everyone coo. (Richard says she is the cutest puppy and she will never get in trouble in his class!) But she slowly shyly came into the center, and she sat every time I told her to. She even started sitting before I gave the command, which threw me off but Richard said was a great sign and deserved a treat.

Finally, Richard gave each of us a platform, and had us take our dogs into separate aisles of the store (in the middle of the customers, which was kind of awkward) to practice "Climb" and "release", or in other words, get on top of the platform and then climb down. For Molly, we had to take the legs off her platform because she is so short! But she did very well.

We all regrouped in the training area. Richard says our homework is to teach our dogs to "shake" with just their left paw. If we can do that, he'll teach us 2 special tricks next week--I missed the first one, but the second one is a praying pose, I think. Molly knows how to shake already, but I let her switch paws. Guess we'll have to work on that this week!