I attended the first day of puppy school with our 9 week old pup this morning. I have a concern I would appreciate opinions on. All went well until the last segment when the trainer had us "off leash" our pups. All young pups, and 'inexperienced' owners, some with children. Telling us to use a collar grab and the command would be "gotcha" as we remove our pup from the situation if it gets out of control. I see a potential problem for a young border collie in a mixed breed class.

I do not have really experienced this, sorry. I'd also love to hear the opinion of others who have experience.
My first reaction when reading this was: It seems to me completely crazy. such young puppies, without experience within such a lot of distractions. Additionally - off leash within such a mess. I have big doubts. Maybe there are reasons for such methods, but as long as I didn't hear a very plausible and convincing justification for this I'd flee from that pigsty in high speed.

 Quote: Steve Mahovlic

I attended the first day of puppy school with our 9 week old pup this morning. I have a concern I would appreciate opinions on. All went well until the last segment when the trainer had us "off leash" our pups. All young pups, and 'inexperienced' owners, some with children. Telling us to use a collar grab and the command would be "gotcha" as we remove our pup from the situation if it gets out of control. I see a potential problem for a young border collie in a mixed breed class.

OMG -- I would quit that class & demand a REFUND of my $$$

Instead of that "training" course, I would order...

(Immediately) http://leerburg.com/120.htm

(Next) http://leerburg.com/puppy-pack-structure.htm

(And then) http://leerburg.com/219.htm

Check to see if you can get some of them in a Discount Set

Perfect advice, Candi, Steve would certainly learn much more like this than in a questionable course. Good luck, Steve, you'll make your way, you're a person who has doubts and then goes on searching for better ways.

Thank you for the tips.
Read up on marker training and am practicing it. I have a number of Leerburg streams and a couple of other DVDs that I spent a couple of months learning from prior to the arrival of our pup.
Your pup 8 wks to 8 months
Est pack structure with your pup
training with food
training recall
power of tug
developing a problem solving puppy
Also
Naughty but nice
Pup2perfection

 Quote: Steve Mahovlic

Thank you for the tips.
Read up on marker training and am practicing it. I have a number of Leerburg streams and a couple of other DVDs that I spent a couple of months learning from prior to the arrival of our pup.
Your pup 8 wks to 8 months
Est pack structure with your pup
training with food
training recall
power of tug
developing a problem solving puppy
Also
Naughty but nice
Pup2perfection

That's GREAT, Steve !!! Then you definitely do NOT need that silly class

Agree on marker training instead of puppy class but I do believe in the socialization aspects of it.

I taught in, addition to obedience classes, back in the early 80s and we didn't let the pups run together until about the third or fourth week.

It was expected of the trainers that they would have decided what pups could and couldn't be set loose with others.

That could be for size, puppies that were to physical, etc.

The classes were also separated between 8 to 12 wks old and 12 to 16 wks.

The trainers judgement was also to decide if that separation should be secondary to the individual pups needs.

We also tried to have an experienced bitch in with each class for the simple reason that those bitches were exceptional at handling rough puppies with out being a monster about it.

Grabbing a puppy with a "gotcha" doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

Ditto to everything Bob said above. What he describes is pretty much the same as my experience in puppy classes. The only difference was we never had an adult bitch in the class. Also, we were never told to grab our pups like you describe. The instructors were experienced enough to know when a pup needed to be redirected or removed from the situation.

I don't feel that allowing young puppies to play together is inherently a bad idea. For most people with a dog that is going to be primarily a family companion, you want that dog to at least be comfortable in the presence of other dogs. Again, similar to Bob's experience, we generally would have different classes for younger and older pups, and often, those were divided further by the instructors into groups depending on size, age, level of activity, etc. As the pups get older and we progress through the series of classes, playtime is gradually faded.

I understand that some owners of future working/sport/competition dogs may raise their pups differently and forego group puppy classes altogether. Still, it does require the experience, knowledge, and opportunity to provide your pup with the right kind of training and socialization.

Bottom line, if you are uncomfortable with the way the class is run, or you don't think it is serving your puppy or the plans you have for him, then you should look elsewhere. But since you asked for opinions, I just wanted to share that puppy classes I am familiar with allow a little bit of playtime, and I was always fine with that.

Steve, I think you are off to an excellent start with that list of DVDs/streams!

Thanks for the feedback. While the research prior to getting the puppy was in depth, it always helps to ensure my interpretation was correct.
I was hoping to use the class as a socialising tool to benefit the pup. If the trainer permits me to slip out before the off leash, i think it will still be of use.

 Quote: Steve Mahovlic

Thanks for the feedback. While the research prior to getting the puppy was in depth, it always helps to ensure my interpretation was correct.
I was hoping to use the class as a socialising tool to benefit the pup. If the trainer permits me to slip out before the off leash, i think it will still be of use.

I see no reason why that would be an issue other then some of the furbaby folks may send you to hell for not allowing your baby play with all his cousins.

JKN.....just a bit.

For ME and MY dogs socializing means my dogs are expected to accept, with a neutral attitude anything and everything I expose them to .

That has nothing to do with allowing them to play with other dogs or people but that's my individual choice.