Teaching how to teach your dog to stay is one of the most important dog training tips out there. Most dogs aren’t very good at standing still long enough to learn anything. They have a natural tendency to want to move and stretch out so that they can be more comfortable. If you want to get them to learn how to stay, then you need to start moving them in the right direction, consistently, and with an appropriate treat.
Start training your dog as early as possible, preferably before he gets any older. Start with a short, low-interval training session, usually no longer than 15 minutes, and slowly increase the time as your dog becomes more comfortable. The basic 5 cues will provide your dog with an incredible foundation for all future training. Your dog should learn to stay by using these cues:
When he has mastered these, start increasing the length of his sessions. The longer the duration, the less he will be distracted by other things in his environment. The longer he stays focused on the duration of your session, the more likely he is to remember it and do it successfully the next time. Make sure to vary the duration and frequency of your practice stay sessions, to make sure your dog really can focus on it. If he distracts you every time he does it, then he’s not very likely to keep practicing.
The next part of how to teach your dog to stay is to get him on a leash. You can practice this in a mirror or in front of a stopwatch. When your dog is on a leash, he will learn to associate the word Stay with the leash and the dog is free to move about and do what he wants to do. Once he gets the hang of the word Stay on the leash, you can then move on to moving on to the actual dog stay command.
The dog stays command for dogs is fairly simple, but there are some variations that you should keep in mind. You need to start by having your dog sit and remain sitting for the amount of time it takes you. As your dog begins to get used to you saying the word Stay, slowly increase the period of time he sits on the leash. Once he remains sitting for a long period of time, he will soon learn to stay without fear of getting taken by surprise from you.
The next step in teaching your dog the stay cue is to distract him. You do this by putting the dog’s attention elsewhere. For example, if you are in a restaurant, you might hold your dog at the table and order something off the menu while talking on the phone. If you have several kids in school, you can distract them all while you go and talk to their teacher by placing your dog in their way. If you have a dog that barks at everything, you could distract him by pointing at the funny dog toy in the distance.
The key to keeping your dog distracted from his desires is consistency. Consistency means consistently going one step forward, followed by one step backwards. The first step of distracting your dog from his desire to eat, is to create a diversion for him. You can use anything, such as a toy or his food bowl, until he gets the point.
Once your dog gets the idea of staying on a given duration, the next step is to move up in duration. You can start with one step, two steps, three steps, and so on. You can also vary the width of the steps, so that the dog gets used to moving forward on a forward motion. Once your dog has started moving forward on a forward motion, you can begin to vary the length of the steps, until eventually, your dog will be accustomed to moving up to longer distances by just shifting his weight forward and backward.
