I've decided to teach Max a hand signal for most of his commands - mostly to give us both something new to do, but also because he managed to pick one up all by himself. We taught him to bark on command and somehow he learnt to do it when we tap our chest. I think possibly cos my husband keeps his hand there with the treat in it. Bark is my husbands favourite command so lot's of reinforcement.

Anyway my question is about subtlety of the signals. For instance I tend to use a signal where my hand is up, palm out but with one finger pointing straight up and the others curled down for the 'stay' command.

Can I then do a signal where my hand is up, palm out but all fingers pointing straight up for something like 'stop'?
Would that be confusing for him because they are so similar?

Rhonda, people give a lot of physical cues to a dog when giving a command or teaching a command that they are often totally unaware of, but the dog sees clear as day.

A full hand vs a single finger is a big difference to a dog, you just have to watch that you don't confuse a dog that has already learned to associate certain gestures or posture or signals with a different command. A lot of dogs get thrown off by this.

To give you an example.. my cousin always tilts her head when she gives her dog a command. I have no idea why she does it. She first taught the dog to sit over the course of about 2 months that is the only thing she did. But she had a heckuva time teaching her to down or do anything else because the dog cued to her body language and less to the actual verbal command. She called me and wanted me to see if I could help her with her dog, I noticed her body language right away now that she knows to pay attention to what she is doing physically, she has not had any more issues.

Dogs pay very close attention to our body language. Things like our breathing pattern and how fast we are blinking, are we smiling? Hand possition, body posture, sitting, standing, crouching, etc.

I use one finger pointing up for sit, two fingers pointing downwards for down, a full hand out for stay, etc.

I'm starting to work with a rescue for lethal whites. As most of the dogs are deaf, they actually use the real ASL signs for their dogs, and they work great.

So because the dog is paying that much attention to body language that would mean both my husband and I would have to be consistent. Otherwise we would confuse him and it would take longer for him to learn what we want him to do right?

I guess that's why sometimes inexplicably he doesn't seem to remember what 'sit' means even though he's usually perfect at it. I guess I don't have to worry at all about subtelty of signals, just pay more attention to exactyly what signals I'm giving. Obviously it's not just about what my hand is doing, but my face, my posture, my eyes, breathing..... well everything really.

Dogs are great for teaching us about ourselves huh?

Yes, they certainly are Rhonda! And really you don't have to put yourself on pause to examine every single thing you are doing at that moment, just try to find the most obvious signals. Hand signals, head tilting/facial expression and exaggerated body posture tend to be the biggest issues. For example if you always widen your eyes and open your mouth when asking for a sit or if you 7 times out of 10 are leaning to one side or forward when you taught him to sit, etc.

The best way is to be aware of yourself before you start teaching the dog something new, and just working to emphasize the verbal/vocal command for existing tricks and commands

Some dogs are not as observant/they are more independent, and some dogs are too observant. It is not always clear to them what we are asking and they naturally look to our body language to try and figure things out.