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A review by thestealthwire
Training the Best Dog Ever: A 5-Week Program Using the Power of Positive Reinforcement by Larry Kay, Dawn Sylvia-Stasiewicz
4.0
I loved this book. There are clearly defined training activities for every dog (and trainer) skill level. The activities focus on things like:
*basic obedience
- sit
- lay
- stay
*socializing
- adults
- dogs
- children
- cats
*grooming manners
*table manners
*walking manners
And there's a chapter dedicated to clicker training (optional but highly recommended) and tricks. There's also a lot of great information that doesn't particularly pertain to a specific behavior but focuses on making you a better trainer - like explaining why slowly withdrawing rewards helps motivate your dog to learn, and why giving the same command multiple times is just going to make your dog think she has to wait to hear the word sit four times before actually following through on the action.
I brought home two 5 year old rescues last year that are a bonded pair, and the ONLY thing this book didn't provide was a guide to walking two dogs on a split lead (as opposed to training one dog to walk with just the owner). I looked up additional information on separation anxiety but my research has found this is largely going to require a professional trainer/behaviorist anyways.
The one thing that brought my review from 5 stars down to 4 was that it's very misleading in the timeframe required to train your dog. Unless you are a professional trainer or work from home and can stop to have another training session once an hour, your dog is probably not going to get through all of this training in a mere 5 weeks. For one, there's just *so much to do* -- which in my opinion is a good thing, because I never needed to consult multiple resources for the vast majority of training my dogs -- but also it's assuming your dog will not struggle more than average with picking up certain skills. Some training activities are to be done six times in one day and then you move on, but either you don't have time to train your pup six times on one activity in a day, or your pup needs more than six repetitions to fully get it down.
*basic obedience
- sit
- lay
- stay
*socializing
- adults
- dogs
- children
- cats
*grooming manners
*table manners
*walking manners
And there's a chapter dedicated to clicker training (optional but highly recommended) and tricks. There's also a lot of great information that doesn't particularly pertain to a specific behavior but focuses on making you a better trainer - like explaining why slowly withdrawing rewards helps motivate your dog to learn, and why giving the same command multiple times is just going to make your dog think she has to wait to hear the word sit four times before actually following through on the action.
I brought home two 5 year old rescues last year that are a bonded pair, and the ONLY thing this book didn't provide was a guide to walking two dogs on a split lead (as opposed to training one dog to walk with just the owner). I looked up additional information on separation anxiety but my research has found this is largely going to require a professional trainer/behaviorist anyways.
The one thing that brought my review from 5 stars down to 4 was that it's very misleading in the timeframe required to train your dog. Unless you are a professional trainer or work from home and can stop to have another training session once an hour, your dog is probably not going to get through all of this training in a mere 5 weeks. For one, there's just *so much to do* -- which in my opinion is a good thing, because I never needed to consult multiple resources for the vast majority of training my dogs -- but also it's assuming your dog will not struggle more than average with picking up certain skills. Some training activities are to be done six times in one day and then you move on, but either you don't have time to train your pup six times on one activity in a day, or your pup needs more than six repetitions to fully get it down.