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When should I start training my German Shepherd puppy?

“How old does my puppy have to be before I can begin training?”

This is a question I am asked often. The German Shepherd puppy in this video is 10 weeks old; but you don’t even have to wait that long! “Training” starts the day you bring your new dog or puppy home to live with you — GSDs are learning all the time. This is why it is easier to prevent problems and bad habits than to solve them later.

But what most people mean when they ask this question is, “How soon can I expect my German Shepherd puppy to start performing tricks and basic obedience behaviors?” Happily, the answer is the same — immediately. Clicker training is an easy and fun way to accomplish this.

Want a smarter dog? Try target training

An easy way to add to your German Shepherd’s repertoire of tricks or commands is to teach her how to target objects.

Targeting (or “target training”) means your dog pays attention to, and then performs an action based on, a particular stimulus (usually an object such as your hand, or a target stick). A dog putting his paw on an object on command, or bumping your hand with his nose upon request, is targeting. Targeting is a super-quick behavior to teach and has a variety of uses.

“Go to your mat” is one handy result of target training. We first teach the dog to “target” his mat, add the cue “Go to your mat,” and then place in a location of our choosing. Agility trainers use targeting quite often to teach their dogs not to skip contact zones while climbing or dismounting obstacles. Service dog trainers use targeting to teach German Shepherds to open doors, turn lights on and off, and more. Target training is useful in the show ring to teach dogs how to gait and stack.

Teaching hand targeting

Targeting your hand is an easy behavior for most dogs to learn. Follow the steps below to get started. You’ll need a clicker, a bunch of small, tasty, easy-to-swallow treats, and a leash (if your dogs needs a reason to stick around).

  1. Remember to always offer your dog a reward after you click, even if you have made an error.
  2. Offer your dog your hand, palm facing the tip of her nose (you can hold your hand in whatever position is most comfortable). Most dogs will sniff or lick your hand out of curiosity. As soon as she touches your hand, click and offer a treat. If your dog does not attempt to touch your hand, put it behind your back for a second or two, then try again. If your dog is having trouble finding your palm, hold it closer to her face. Click only when she reaches and touches your palm with her nose.
  3. Timing is everything! Be sure you are clicking as the dog’s nose touches your hand, not after. Otherwise, she won’t understand which behavior is earning a treat.
  4. Add the word “touch” or “target” just as your dog touches your hand. As your dog becomes more fluent, begin asking your dog to touch your palm, using the command.
  5. Raise and lower the target hand so that your dog has to take several steps to reach it. Have you moved it closer and closer to the ground, and up high so she has to stand up on her hind legs to reach it? Have you moved across the floor and had her follow you, nose to the target, as if her nose was magnetized?
  6. Begin asking your German Shepherd to target other objects with her nose, such as small container lids, pieces of cloth, the end of a stick, etc. You can also vary the length of time the dog must keep her nose on your hand or target object before she gets her click and treat.

Of course, you can teach your dog to target any number of objects, whether portable or not. The most portable object I ever used to teach target training was a sticker, which could then be placed anywhere, including unmovable places like walls!

German Shepherd Site Herder

Here are a few blogs and blog communities whose pages you should bookmark (besides this one)! All About Dog Training Blog Carnival offers a variety of articles on dog training, currently in its second edition; ClickerTraining.com offers both a community training blog and blogs written by users; and the Dog.com Community is packed with features allowing you to connect with other German Shepherd fans, including blogging and photo gallery tools and forums.

GermanShepherds.com has it all for the German Shepherd lover — forums, chat rooms, articles, dog food recipes, a photo club, you name it. And Yahoo! offers a variety of German Shepherd-related e-mail lists through its Yahoo! Groups service. My favorites are GSD-Euro, German Shepherd Dog Genetics and German Shepherd Dogs.

Teach your dog his name – for real, though

If I had a dollar for every time a dog training client insisted, “Oh, he knows his name!”, and then proceeded to demonstrate by calling her dog repeatedly while the pooch is busily sniffing the ground in front of him — I’d have enough money to buy all my readers an ice cream (or beer, your choice).

When and how these dogs “learned” their names is a mystery — mine weren’t born knowing theirs, nor did a few repetitions during puppyhood do the trick. Let’s dispense with wishful thinking and get busy teaching our German Shepherds the most important word they’ll ever hear: their names. The good news is, this simple, life-saving word can be taught in literally a matter of minutes.

All you’ll need to do is grab your dog, a leash (if you need it to keep him nearby), and 50 or so really, really good treats. I’m not talking about dog biscuits or those pre-packaged, food coloring-filled store-bought treats — we mean business here. I’m talking about hot dogs, chicken, turkey, pieces of salami, roast beef, and the like. The good stuff. The stuff you were always told not to feed your dog from the table. Anything your dog would love to get his little paws on counts. (Obviously, check with your vet if your dog has dietary or medical issues.)

You don’t need to use big treats — slices or bits the size of your pinky nail work just fine for even the largest dogs. This is a treat your dog loves, remember?

If you want to go high-tech with your training, get a clicker as well. Remember to condition your dog to the clicker before getting started, if it’s your first time using one. If you don’t have a clicker, no worries — with this exercise, you can simply skip that step in the following instructions:

  • Place the treats within easy reach for you, but where your dog cannot get them.
  • Say the dog’s name, click the clicker and feed a treat. Do not ask for a sit, do not call the dog from a distance, and do not repeat the dog’s name. Click as soon as you say the dog’s name and feed a treat.
  • If your dog isn’t paying attention, move backwards with the leash in your hand. Wait for the dog to look at you, say his name, then click and treat.
  • Repeat with all treats. Do this exercise at least twice a day in different locations.

Name 1
Name 2Name 3

Once you’ve done this exercise for a couple of sessions, test its effectiveness by saying your dog’s name while he’s not looking. His head should snap up and he should focus his big greedy brown eyes on you in hopes of getting a treat. If he does, congratulations! You’re ready to move him outside and repeat the process. If not, check that you’re still using a super-yummy treat in a non-distracting environment and repeat the exercise a few times before testing it again.