Puppy Diaries: Back to Kindergarten

This week Jill Abramson shares some of her experiences in Puppy Kindergarten. As mentioned earlier in the series, Scout is attending kindergarten classes at Pawsitive Teach, which is owned and run by my friend, Diane Abbott.


 
Jill says:

The point of puppy kindergarten, which many professional trainers recommend, is to socialize dogs and teach them basic manners and commands. It’s also useful for trouble-shooting common behavioral issues, like barking, jumping up on people or chewing, and for curbing fear-based aggression. The owners learn how to communicate effectively with their dogs and to handle them.

Yes, yes and by the way, yes!

Puppy kindergarten is probably the single best thing you can do for a new puppy because it provides your puppy with socialization.

What is socialization? Socialization is controlled and positive exposure to a variety of people, places, animals, and things. It must be both controlled and positive. Simply tossing a puppy “in the deep end” is not socialization. If the experiences are negative or overwhelming, more harm than good will be done. A well run puppy class provides a pup with these experiences, under the supervision of an experienced instructor.

Socialization is so important that the American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior. (AVSAB) has stated that the risks of skipping puppy socialization are greater than the risks of exposing a puppy to infectious disease before she is fully vaccinated.

Puppy class also has another very important benefit: bite inhibition. Dogs have very precise control over how much force they exert with their jaws. The real danger in a dog bite is not sharp teeth: it’s the amount of pressure applied, along with whether or not the dog decides to move his head, causing deadly rips or tears.

Puppies normally learn how to control their biting when they play with each other. If a puppy bites too hard, as Scout apparently did during one of the play sessions in class, the other dog will yelp and perhaps even end the play session. Very quickly the “offender” learns to inhibit her bites if she wants play to continue. This teaches the puppy what hurts and what does not.

How can a puppy that is separated from her litter and taken to a house full of only people learn this? She can’t. Taking a dog home and waiting until she is 6 months or older to meet other dogs is a recipe for disaster. And by the way, the one or two dogs you might already have at home don’t count. Variety is an important part of socialization.

Moreover, human skin is quite a bit softer than a dog’s and puppies need to learn how to control themselves with people. This process, which I am not going try to explain in a short blog post, is another critical part of puppy class.

For more information on puppy classes, check out Dog Star Daily’s puppy class section.

Related Posts

1. What are the most important things you can do for your puppy? Part 2 – Socialization
2. What are the most important things you can do for your puppy? Part 1 – Bite Inhibition
3. Puppy Diaries: Adolescence
4. The Puppy Diaries: Life With a New Puppy