Quote: jeff vanstee

Food training and voice commands with hands signals if that answer your question

Are you marker training? I'm lost.

and

 Quote: Aaron Myracle

Did the puppy ever perform well outside of class?

Or is this a case of the puppy doing great in class, and badly everywhere else?

20 weeks old, jeez!
Patience already.

I'm still working with my almost two year old snot.
I expect to still be working with him a year from now.....the brat.
If I don't continue to work with him 5 years from now I expect he'll tell me to go f myself in no uncertain terms.

20 weeks, jeez!
Patience already.

Hint: the search function on this forum is quite deep.

Hi Jeff, welcome to the forum. Sounds like your pup started obedience class at a very young age if he's five months now and your class was two months long. Was this a once-a-week class? How much training do you do on a daily basis? A puppy will have a short attention span and need several very short (maybe five minutes) training sessions. Equally important is making sure the puppy is getting enough play and exercise to expend some of his natural energy.

I'm not sure exactly what kind of "food training" you did, but do yourself a huge favor and learn everything you can about marker training (Melissa's link is the place to get started).

This puppy is too young to be expected to perform off-leash obedience exercises. Of course, he's going to be distracted by everything going on. When he came to you and sat with his back to you, it's because there was something else that was way more interesting than you! This is where marker training will be your friend.

If your trainer has abandoned you, then by all means find another one. Your future plans for the puppy will determine what kind of trainer you need. The bottom line is your puppy is still very young and I don't think you have anything to worry about. Sounds like he's being a typical puppy for his age. Just keep working at it and don't get discouraged!

okay, that is good to know because i just want to make sure i was in the right track and not messing up with my daily training.i do have another question.when can i go for the next step up training?

he did very well in the facility and we do the traing at home but never outside just play time and walks.

When he's performing the commands he learned in the first class, reliably in the yard.

He may not understand yet that the commands still mean the same thing, outside of the location he originally learned them.

Start over, the "re-teach" the sit, exactly the same way he learned it in class, in the yard. It might help to have him a bit hungry, and use some particularly smelly food, to make it easier for him to ignore distractions.

Some dogs don't "generalize" well at first, and don't realize that "sit" means to put my butt on the ground in the livingroom as well as in the dining room, etc.

It's a puppy....let it be a puppy!!! I would NEVER correct a pup for anything!

If there is a problem...go back & start at the begining & retrain. There is confusion on the part of the pup. NOT defiance. Not intent on the part of the pup to disobey. Just a pup being a pup & HIGHLY distracted. No a reason to correct that young of a dog.

yes, he was in private training class for 8 weeks.we take him once aweek for an hour session.
at home, we train him like 5-10 mins at a time maybe 7-9 times a day.he is very good and very smart and he did a wonderful job.we are checking on markers training and we will check melissa's link.we did off lease so that he can walk with us in a close environment to see if he stays with us and how much he knows of the commands.he follows us and that is it.
i am so glad that was a normal behaviour.Phew ! though, we mess up some where and he went back..lol.
Thank you and all of you who answer our topic :}

Thank you so much.it is good to know what you said and such a relieve.Thank you so much again.
the way, our trainer said it was.. he was playing us.he knows his commands and she was very eager to signed us for next round but we decide to wait until he is little older and knows his commands well.
thank you again :}

It takes around 200 repetitions for a dog to really learn the command (in that environment). The pup is just at teething age, a pup! Expecting the pup to perform like a WUSV level dog is like expecting your 3 yr old son to be a green beret! It is not going to happen.