7d • Trusty Tidbits
What To Do When Training Plateaus
When it comes to training your dog whether it is for detection, social skills or predation substitution there may come a time where training just seems to stagnate. Depending on what you are working on and what your goal is this may not be a bad thing per se but generally speaking we want our dogs to be their best and that means challenging them.
Challenging our dogs, so they have the chance to improve and learn new skills, must be done strategically. It is important to have a strong foundation for what you need as well, that way, if the challenge is too difficult, your dog has a practiced and approved skill to fall back on. If this occurs just reevaluate and adjust in a way to ensure your dog is successful. Often times this includes setting up the problem different entirely or breaking it down into smaller steps. The other benefit of a strong foundation is that if your dog were to “fail” at the challenge then they are less likely to “fall apart” when the intended end goal is not met.
Some suggestions for getting out of the plateau and on to progress would be to try a new area, different time of day, different reward, change the distance or even take some time off and, within reason, allow your dog and yourself to just go somewhere and exist. While dogs are constantly learning, this is true, they also need time to enjoy being outside, going out and just going on a sniffari. Obviously if your dog has a trigger that really gets them I would suggest avoiding areas that contain that trigger as best you can that way you and your dog can enjoy being outside together with very little pressure to perform. If this needs to be done in multiple short sessions throughout the day/week that is ok.
What are some things that you have done when you notice training starting to plateau? Feel free to share so we may learn from each other!
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What To Do When Training Plateaus
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