You are going to love marker training. I can hardly stress enough how the clarity of it will change the way you teach and the way the dog learns.

When the pup has an accident inside, that's handler error. He was inside when he needed to be outside. If you catch him starting, you can swoop him outside and praise for outdoor potty when he goes outdoors. If you don't catch him in the act, the time for doing something about it has passed. Period. The pup has zero idea why he is smacked near pee or has his nose in pee or any of the other old-school "training" methods. He just knows that Dad sometimes does unpleasant things for no reason he knows. The act of peeing is long forgotten, and any "guilt" that we may think we see is anxiety or fear about Dad's anger or demeanor.

Have you tried any marker training at all? (Like "yes" or a click for a behavior, quickly followed by a high-value treat, after loading the marker, or impressing the connection between the marker and the reward?)

i'm not very experienced, so maybe i'm totally off, if so - smart people please say - but one thing i've found useful is not looking at what my dogs do as 'right' or 'wrong'.

instead i look at as, what am i doing, or providing (in terms of leadership/training) that is good, and what needs to change. i have a dog who is aggressive and who has really challenged me - and one thing my trainer that i've taken her to (the FR trainer of my puppy) taught me is that obedience and behaviour doesn't come in a vacuum. she's got instincts, drive and learnt behaviour. so it's up to me to make myself the best person to be around, and to follow, and to respect. not right/wrong. and he's also taught me to take everything as a training opportunity. i don't just train during training sessions - when she does something i don't like, she's not doing something wrong, she's presenting me with a training opportunity

i don't know, maybe it's just semantics, but i find that a more helpful way to look at it than right/wrong. it's helped to change how i approach her and i really think she/we are doing well.

I agree with you, Jennifer. Right and wrong are definitely human concepts.

 Quote: jennifer mullen

i'm not very experienced, so maybe i'm totally off, if so - smart people please say - but one thing i've found useful is not looking at what my dogs do as 'right' or 'wrong'......

......i don't know, maybe it's just semantics, but i find that a more helpful way to look at it than right/wrong. it's helped to change how i approach her and i really think she/we are doing well.

I'm not one of the smart ones, but that sounds spot on to me.

A dog, especially a puppy, that is doing "wrong" is only doing it because I wasn't pro-active stopping that behavior.

If he pees in the floor, I should have had him outside 5 minutes ago. If he nips my hand, then I shouldn't let him get my hand in his mouth.

 Quote: michael_wise

If he pees in the floor, I should have had him outside 5 minutes ago. If he nips my hand, then I shouldn't let him get my hand in his mouth.

Exactly.

And as Mike S said early in the thread..... "Basic Puppy Rule #1: If you don't give them the opportunity to do something, then the habit won't develop and they will grow out of it. Let a puppy be a puppy and show them what they are supposed to do instead of whacking em on the ass when they are following their instincts. ... Dogs learn from repetition and habit. If you do the same thing with a dog over and over, then they will do it automatically without having to correct them for it."

 Quote: Michael curry

thats why im here to learn

thanks

Excellent, you will really like this site and I really think you will find the benefits from these methods will create better bonds and happier, more willing dogs.

I think I took your post a roughly by the way it was written. And, although I do not agree with any of it (except maybe spanking kids to a point), I see what you were trying to say.

 Quote: Michael curry

he bit my nose so instictivly i reacted with a smack on the nose. he hes yet to nip or bit me even when playing since then..

In what world was that fair, Michael? Did he know it was wrong to grab your nose? You smacked him out of anger and revenge. Hopefully you don't plan on ever doing bitework with this dog- because that incident will put a serious damper on the pup's enthusiasm for bitework.

 Quote: Michael curry

and yes i was brought up with a smack on the ass when i did something wrong, and i feel that if more parents today smacked their kids from time to time when doing wrong there wouldnt be kids shooting other kids in schools.

Ironically, after 7 years in and around Military Law Enforcement, I couldn't disagree with you more. Just like with puppies, the main problem with today's youth is a lack of supervision, NOT a lack of spankings.

 Quote: Michael curry

extreamly uncalled for, theres a huge diff between a smack on the ass to a kid then beating the crap out of him. get it straight..

Only if the child understands WHY they are being spanked, and knew ahead of time that what they were doing was wrong. Otherwise, it is abuse. Abuse isn't a matter of how hard you hit a child. It's a matter of the impact on the child- which is why there are such things as emotional abuse. Hitting a child, OR a dog, when they have no concept of what they've done wrong, is NOT discipline. It's abuse. Plain and simple.
If I walk up to my son, and smack him, and he never knows why, that's not discipline. I just hit him, and so much as he knows, it was for no reason.
If you hit your dog, and it doesn't know why, guess what... It ain't discipline.

Controlling anything through fear of pain- a child, a spouse, or a dog, is abuse.

 Quote: Michael curry

now i am trying to learn better and easier ways to train my puppy then the old fashiond smack on the ass.

Trust me, you'll never look back once you see the results you can get with motivational training. You'll wonder why you didn't discover it sooner.

Just a P.S.:

Marker training and good pack leadership and good housetraining -- these are things that can be started on the way to change today.

Ordering the DVDs (#302 is a "How to live with the dog" as well as basic ob video) and then listening to a couple of podcasts and doing a short marker training session -- these are immediate steps. "Right now" steps. So much can flow from these small steps that I feel kind of excited for you.

 Quote: Alyssa Myracle

....Trust me, you'll never look back once you see the results you can get with motivational training.

So true!

Get yourself some small high value treats.

thank you janice, and yes i have been reading them, and its not so much the potty training, hes starting to get an attitude like a teenager would get lol, thats what i need to break first.

Well then, these might help, too. I don't think Lynne or Connie gave these to you:
http://leerburg.com/bitingpuppies.htm
http://leerburg.com/trainpupsdirectory.htm
Good luck with re-training yourself and your puppy!