How To Transition Dog Training From Lessons To Real Life

00:00 — Kati opens the episode by asking listeners to subscribe before discussing real-life dog training.

Welcome to Off Leash and Unfiltered Trigger Warning. I'm Kati Peppe, delivering the Truth in Dog Training.

Hey everybody, this is your host, Kati Peppe. Before we jump in, I just wanted to take a quick second and remind you to hit the subscribe button because that helps us so, so, so much. We appreciate every subscribe and follow, and we have so much valuable information we wanna share with you. So we don't want you to miss an episode. Without further ado, let's jump in. Hey guys, thanks for joining me today. Hope everybody's pumped this morning, um, on this wonderful, what day is it? What day is this coming out? Um, Monday, I think. Yeah, Monday.

Great. Monday's a great day, <laugh>. If it's not, you should try to figure that out. Um, or at least figure out a way to make it a little bit better. Um, we like Mondays around here, we like every day, every day is the same around here. Um, yeah, so let's talk about your day and what your day looks like with your dog and how you make your days look like your training, quote unquote lessons, right?

Because sometimes I'll get this question, and it's a great question. I actually really love getting this question, which is like, how do we take these training lessons and these things we've taught our dog, and how do we make them just part of our life? Like how do we transition to actually using this training? Um, and I think that's so great when people are being proactive about it and, and they realize that there's that aspect to it because it's so true that if you carve out time to spend with your dog having these training lessons, like that's great.

Like you're a very committed person putting in the time, the work, the effort, the consistency, all these things. But if you just have lessons with your dog and then the lessons over and that's it, then that's what you'll get, right? Your dog will be more engaged and perform better during the lesson because school is in session.

And so, to be honest, that's part of the reason that we use the very, very high level of structure that we use. So if you're familiar with me at all, and, and what we do here, primarily we're board and trained, but even in our private lessons, this is the recommendation that we give to our clients. Your dog should be in the kennel when, whenever you're not working with them. If you're not with your dog doing something, even if that's something is playing or, or going outside to get some exercise, going for a walk, you know, but also training, obviously then your dog's in the kennel.

03:00 — Kati recommends kenneling the dog whenever it is not supervised, exercised, played with, or…

No, not forever, but for now. And that's part of the magic if you do that, is your dog doesn't, your normal life, your old life, it's over now, right? So if you do this, it helps to give you a very clean cut transition from like, this was our old life where things were a little crazy and you didn't really listen to me and you had all these bad behaviors, you know, whatever it was with your dog to transition to.

Things are different now, right? Because here's the thing, it's going, it's going to take you a little while to teach your dog the things you wanna teach them and to eliminate the behaviors that you wanna eliminate. And so if you have your dog out of their kennel, just running around doing whatever they want in the house, even if they're a good dog, right? I'm not talking about bad dogs or dogs with like bad behaviors, um, that are, you know, like aggressive dogs or highly reactive dogs and any dog at all, right? No dog's, perfect. Um, the point is, if you have them free roaming, autonomous, doing whatever they wanna do, then of course they're going to do their old behaviors, right?

But if you are willing to say, you know what, this is a marathon, not a sprint, it's worth the sacrifice right now for what it's gonna get me later.

I'm gonna go ahead, I am going to go all in with this structure stuff that Kati talks about. I'm gonna put my dog in the kennel when we're not doing something together. Um, and once they have a good place command, I can use the place command in lieu of the kennel sometimes, okay, I'm gonna do that because now if I do that, my dog can't run around and do their old stuff anymore, right? And so now I can take a week, two weeks, a month, two months, whatever, whatever you need to accomplish what you wanna accomplish, okay?

And you spend that time taking your dog out of the kennel and teaching them, this is what we do, this is what we don't do, this is what we do, this is what we don't do. And of course, you can play with your dog, of course you can take them out, go for a walk, um, throw the Frisbee around whatever you wanna do, but they're not running around doing their old stuff, right? If your dog doesn't come back when called, they're not off a leash, put 'em on a long line. So whatever your problems were, you now are controlling that until your dog has a sufficient level of training, right?

06:00 — Owners should operate their homes like board-and-trains before gradually returning freedom.

So you kind of operate your home like a board and train.

That's the best way to do it. And so then when you start giving your dog some free time, again, we recommend you don't just do that all at once, right? You don't go from this super high level of structure where your dog has like no freedom and no autonomy to going, okay, you're out now, right? Like you're out of prison, we're gonna set you free. Um, because what do those folks do? They usually go and commit a crime right away. But anyway, neither here nor there, we're not gonna get into it. Um, you give your dog all that freedom and then it, it's kind of, they're likely to regress, right?

So we tell people small periods of freedom at first and just ease into it, right? It doesn't mean you need to spend years doing this, but you don't wanna shut it off all at once.

Like, we're in this high level of structure for, you know, three weeks, four weeks, whatever it is, and then one day you're just done with it and now we're just gonna jump back into our old life. 'cause that's what will happen. You'll jump back into your old life and it'll be the old stuff again. It'll probably be easier to get it on track because you've done a lot of work with your dog, but you know it's gonna be sloppy, messy. Your dog's gonna try to revert to all this old stuff. We recommend, hey, give your dog 10 minutes of free time, especially if they have behaviors in the house that they're sneaky about.

Okay? So if you have a dog that goes and steals socks or goes and hides around the corner to go pee in the dining room or whatever it is, if you have a dog that likes to chew on the sofa, you know, whatever their issues are that they're sneaky about giving your dog, that real short period of free time enables you to actually watch them, right?

Because nobody can watch their dog all day. I have an episode on that specific thing in how to stop your dog Sneaky behavior. So I'll link to that in the show notes, um, later. I can't remember what episode number it is, but it's a good one. And you should go back and listen to that episode. If your dog has any sneaky stuff that they do. And I know most of our dogs have something or other <laugh> that when, when they know you're not looking, they're like, now's my chance. Um, but giving your dog those short periods of free time actually enables you to watch your dog, right?

So we all say we're watching, um, but we're not. We're doing other things. We're making dinner. We're busy, we're on a work call, we're watching the kids. We've got 10. We're multitasking. You're not watching your dog. So if you start with small periods of freedom, 10 minutes, 15 minutes, then you can, you can really devote your time to watching your dog, right?

And pretend you're distracted, but you are actually watching. So if your dog sneaks off to do that stuff, you can address it. You can give them a correction for that, and you can knock that stuff out. If you are not doing that, if you just go back to full freedom, you're gonna be doing something else and your dog's gonna go do that old behavior, and guess what? They're gonna get away with it. That's what's gonna happen. And so then even if you catch it, sometimes you're not gonna knock that behavior out because it's inconsistent. And the pattern that we're presenting to the dog is inconsistent.

09:00 — Returning to full freedom lets dogs rehearse unwanted behaviors and get away with them.

And your corrections will also need to be much, much higher to be effective because you're inconsistent, right? So your dog's pa your dog's brain is gonna keep searching for the pattern of like, when does this behavior get corrected and when does it not?

And unless you provide a correction that is, makes it absolutely not worth the risk of testing, you're gonna keep testing. Okay? So 10 minutes of free time so you can watch, knock some of that stuff out. 20 minutes of free time, 30 minutes of free time, however long you're able to actually watch, right? And once you get to a place where you can have your dog free for an hour, two hours and they're not doing any of that stuff, then maybe you really start to increase the free time. But don't rush it. To me, that's the way to do it.

'cause it covers all of your bases. It doesn't leave any loose ends. It enables you to truly get to a place where you're getting what you want. You're able to live with your dog without managing them so much, and you're able to trust them more.

If you do it any other way, you might not get to that place. And if you're okay with that, okay? But this is how we do it and I feel it's highly, highly worth it. Um, you know, on the last episode I talked about our dogs don't live that long. It's like, how long do you want to have to manage them? How long do you want to have to not trust them? How long do you want to have to keep their world smaller, lock them up, use the gate, keep them in the kennel, all these things.

I'm not saying any of those things are bad, but people have to use them to varying degrees, right? Some people have dogs that just can't be in a room alone for two seconds. So whatever it looks like for you, like you have to decide. But if you do it this way, it's almost foolproof, which is why we love it.

And there's so many peripheral valuable things that you get out of it as well, using that structure and using your kennel. Uh, which I won't go into 'cause I know I talk about it all the time, but more kennel time for a little while is probably not a bad thing. And it enables you to really control every single interaction with your dog. Every time they come out of the kennel, you're engaging with them. So you're really strengthening your bond, your relationship, your relevance, right? Your dog's gonna become so much more tuned into you too. But every time they come out of their kennel, it is to shape things.

12:00 — Consistent feedback makes every kennel release an opportunity to shape and correct behavior.

It is to give them feedback. This is good. I like this reward. This, this is not good. I don't like that. It's a correction, right? So your dog is literally spending 100% of their time outside of their kennel, learning how to live with you, learning how to live in your home, learning how to walk in your neighborhood, learning how to behave when people come through your door.

Whatever the things are you wanna teach your dog, instead of my dog runs around, does whatever they want all day. They're not rehearsing calmness, they're not rehearsing controlling impulses. They're not rehearsing staying engaged with me. They're just doing whatever they want. And occasionally they're getting away with stuff I don't like because I don't see it. Can you see how that is way, way less effective, way less effective, right? And we, we take 20 or 30 minutes and we go and we have a training lesson and the dog does great, but then I put the treats down or the e-collar down or both or whatever you're using, and we just go back to life.

And it's the same old thing. My dog's kind of doing stuff and I'm not paying attention. And um, it, that's not effective guys.

So use your kennel and use your structure while you're shaping what you want. And then move into slowly increasing freedom with supervision. And then you'll organically come to a place where your dog is just good, right? They just listen to you. They don't get into trouble, they don't look for trouble, and you'll be able to trust them. Now, is that true for all dogs and all levels of trust? Like, will you be able, do you have a dog where you'll be able to leave the house and they can stay outta their kennel for five hours, six hours, eight hours and not get into trouble?

I don't know. Every dog is different, right? But the point is, this is how you will get the best possible results for you and your dog. So that's what I recommend. However, um, I think the most important thing, especially, you know, let's take my clients that are doing private lessons that aren't doing board and train.

I still recommend that process to them. Most of them don't do it. I'm sure <laugh>, I'm sure especially the people that don't have the dogs with serious, serious behavioral issues, you know, those people are a little more likely to be committed and all in and, you know, do whatever we have to do to make, uh, progress. 'cause the stakes are so much higher. Um, but you have someone with a pretty run of the mill dog, you know, simple nuisance behaviors, nothing serious. Those people are a lot less likely to follow the recommendation, um, at least to the, to a TI think most people try, they do increase their structure, they do increase their kennel time.

Maybe they use a kennel where they didn't even use one before. Um, but very few people are using it the way we recommend to use it. Love the show. Well, I have great news.

We are offering an inexpensive subscription to our new premium content. This is content that isn't available to the general public. We make it just for our subscribers. We're gonna cover a variety of new topics in these episodes, and I think it's gonna be a ton of fun. So you can jump right down into the show notes to get that website address and then skip over there and sign up for this premium content. Just wanted to take a second to let you guys know about that. Thank you so much for your support and now on with the show, um, which is what we just talked about.

Um, and really eliminating that freedom for a little while and then gradually reintroducing it after you've had some time to work with your dog. Um, let's say that you're coming in and you're saying, oh yeah, yeah, Kati, I'll do that, wink wink.

And you go home and you're using your kennel more, but you're not using it all the time. Um, or using a high, high level of structure all the time. Like we kind of tell you to at first. You are, you're kind of, you're using it when you're gone, right? You're using your kennel overnight when you're in bed, um, and during the day you might have a period of time where you put your dog in the kennel, but it's, it's, you know, for a couple of hours just for the sake of building the coping skills like we talked about.

And other than that, your dog is, is kind of loose and free roaming and he is pretty good around the house. So, so you don't have, uh, an issue with that, okay? So let's say you're that person.

If you want training to become just life, then you really need to be all over it. First of all, you don't wanna stay stuck in quote unquote lessons, right? So it's like, yes, you will have to carve out time and work with your dog to teach them something new. And I think the biggest reason people get stuck in that mode is because they never shift gears from teaching something new to expecting something that's known. So I'll say that again. You carve out time and you teach your dog something new, okay? But after you've done that, and I don't mean one lesson, I mean several lessons, several days, weeks, however long it takes for your dog to learn this new thing.

17:00 — Owners get stuck when they keep teaching behaviors instead of transitioning to expecting known…

Once you've taught them something new, you have to eventually graduate from kindergarten and start expecting it. So until you make that shift from teaching something new to expecting something that they know, right?

Because you've already taught it, they know it, you make that shift, then it becomes part of life, right? You can actually use it. So for instance, I teach my dog the place command, okay? I spend 10 or 15 minutes a couple times a day working on the place command. We're a week in, we're a week into the training. My dog knows to get on place when I tell him to, to get off when I say break. He's been working for food, we've started working with distractions. I've started mildly disagreeing with getting off the place cot when there's a distraction, right?

But he'll still make mistakes. He's not perfect. Um, and we've done lots of that. It's like, okay, well at some point you have to just put him on there in real life and no, he's not gonna stay because you haven't taken that step that says this is not negotiable.

You have to stay, right? So when you do that is up to you. Your dog has to understand the thing you're asking before you start correcting him for non-compliance. But if you never make that jump, then it will never work in real life. Your dog, your dog will never stay there because there's no reason to, unless you have a dog like Draco <laugh>, if you just look at him, he is like, oh my God, I don't want any trouble. I'll go back to place. Um, I'm just kidding. You should never do that anyway. You should never threaten your dog with a look.

But I'm just saying he's that soft and he's that soft and sensitive. Like he really does not like it when you disapprove of his behavior. Um, which is great. We love that. We love Draco. He is awesome. Um, but yeah, I think part of the problem people have is not making that shift from this is something new we're working on to this is something, you know, and I expect it, right? But even during that middle phase where your dog is still not a hundred percent fluent, still needs some help, still needs some guidance, you gotta use it, guys.

You, you got to use it. And I'm gonna go back here because it's hard if you do it your way, okay? Where your dog has all this freedom, it's much harder.

20:00 — Giving excessive freedom during the messy learning phase makes real-life training harder to manage.

Here's why. Because during that messy middle phase where your dog is starting to learn this new thing, right? But you're not quite to the phase yet where it's non-negotiable and they're just corrected. If they don't do it during that middle phase, that's gonna be hell on your actual life because you need to give that attention to your dog, right? You can't put them on place in real life and just expect them to stay there. If they haven't had the training yet, they're not going to, right? And so now you are basically forcing yourself to try to train your dog during your real life while it's happening, right?

So you're, if you say, oh, I'm gonna put my dog on place, and then someone happens to come to the door and you're in that middle phase of training with your dog, okay, well now someone's at your door, but you have to address your dog with whatever feedback and whatever guidance necessary.

And you've got someone at your door, like in real life who's waiting for you, okay? And that's your fault because you didn't want to use a high level of structure where you're controlling the environment. Not that that couldn't happen, right? Because it could be that you are using that high level of structure and you're in the middle of a training lesson with your dog, and life happens and someone comes to the door. But here's the difference when it happens in that instance, you're already engaged with the dog, you're prepared, right? If you're eco training, you've probably got your eco remote with you.

You don't, you're not in a position where you're doing 10 different things at once. You don't know where your remote is, and you are like, fuck it, I'll deal with it later. We'll look at it later, we'll do this later, right? Because that, that doesn't work, right? Your training's gonna suffer. So even though real life can always catch you off guard, there's a big difference between it catching you off guard and you're still able to address it and deal with it in the moment like you're supposed to for the benefit of your training versus real life catches you off guard and you let everything slide because you're overwhelmed in the moment.

And you will be right? Because you weren't focused on dog training when this all went down. You were focused on answering the phone and the door and the smoke alarms going off, and dinner's burning and <laugh>. The cat got outside, you know, whatever it is, right? You've got 10 things going on at once. You're engrossed in a project, someone comes to the door, the last thing on your mind was dog training and then life happened. So that's kind of the difference. When you use the high level of structure, it just gives you cleaner results because it gives you cleaner training, it makes everything easy.

23:00 — High structure produces cleaner results by reducing surprise situations when everyday life interrupts training.

Here's what people don't realize. They fight it and fight it and fight it, but it makes everything easier for them.

The results will be better. Not just because the dog is focused on you, but because you are actually focused on the dog. So don't get it backwards. Using that high, high level of structure allows you to have a level of control over the environment and your training lessons that you just won't have if you're just trying to do your training organically in real life, right? Because things are gonna catch you off guard all the time, unless it's a training lesson, right? So real life isn't going to wait for your dog to be trained, I guess is my point.

It's just not gonna wait, right? So let's say you don't want your dog to jump on people, and so you've listened to my stuff and you know, you're like, all right, I'm gonna set this up. I'm gonna have so and so come over. My dog's gonna jump.

I'm gonna say no, I'm gonna correct them. And you do that, but it's your first time doing it. So maybe you weren't quite high enough, right? Maybe it looked good in the moment, dog stopped jumping, but you weren't quite high enough. So now the dog is gonna do it again. And the next time someone catches you off guard, they come to your door, dog jumps, you're totally unprepared for it. You don't know where your remote is. Or maybe you just don't feel like you can go get it because it's a service person and they, you know what I mean?

You don't wanna be rude and walk away and all this stuff. And it's like, okay, well that is happening because you didn't wanna use the high level of structure, right? So that's the price you pay, it's okay, but it's going to be a lot harder. It's going to be a lot messier.

'cause real life isn't going to wait. It's going to happen. So while your dog is outside of the kennel or off their place cot or whatever the case, they're not in structure, they're not controlled, they're free roaming, they're autonomous. Life is going to happen and your dog is going to respond to it. And you either give them the appropriate feedback, good, bad, or you don't. And I think it's just obvious that there will be lots of times that you don't. 'cause real life is gonna take precedence over your dog training. And so your dog training is going to suffer.

And so that's the long and short of it. Guys, my advice, use a super high level of structure while you're working on things with your dog, and then slowly filter in the freedom afterwards. But if you don't, then I think you just really need to not stay stuck in doing those short lessons forever. Once your dog knows it, you have to start just doing it in real life. And then you have to be prepared to address things when needed, when real life catches you off guard and just understand that it's going to. And so I also think a key piece to your plan needs to be, I'm not going to ask my dog for anything in real life until I know he can do it.

26:00 — Without structure, owners should stop endless lessons and use known commands in real life…

Doesn't mean he won't make mistakes, but they'll be rare, right? I know he can do it and I know that I can address it efficiently and move on. If you're not to that point yet, then don't ask your dog for those things in real life. Don't put yourself in a position where your dog is going to, you and your dog are going to get caught off guard. Mistakes are gonna be made and you can't address it. Don't put yourself in that position, right? It's like, just like any other time, this applies all the time. Even after your dog is well-trained, it's like, don't ask your dog for something if you're unable or unwilling to address it properly, right?

Because you're going to shoot yourself in the foot. But so this becomes especially, especially important when you're in the training process with your dog, right? They're not even fluent at something yet, or you haven't gotten to the phase of training yet where you're holding them highly accountable, right?

Where there's truly a negative consequence for non-compliance. If you're not to that stage yet, and you're going to ask your dog for things in real life, it's gonna be super, super important that you're ready for your dog to make those mistakes and for you to be able to address them. Is this making sense? I feel like I'm not articulating it super well. I'm just kind of babbling on about, about this. But I think, I think the key takeaway here is you can train your dog however you want, right? Maybe you use this high level of structure, which I recommend, um, or maybe you don't.

But the bottom line is, if your dog makes mistakes or defies you, whatever the case may be, doesn't matter if your dog isn't doing the right behaviors, the feedback needs to come. So ultimately you don't use the commands and the behaviors you've taught your dog in real life unless, and until, until you know that that will happen. But in addition to that, I also recommend that you get to that phase as soon as possible. Otherwise you'll just stay stuck in kindergarten with your dog forever, right? You'll be carving out 10 and 20 minute sessions and working with your dog and that will just be your life forever.

29:00 — Commands belong in real life only when the dog understands them and the owner…

You'll never transition, right? So you have to actively do the training and move them through it and advance them through it to the phase where you're actually holding them accountable. And then that's when it becomes easier to actually make it part of your life and actually ask them for things in real life.

Because now you have recourse when they don't do it right. And they know how to respond to that because you've done it with your training. But if you stay stuck in kindergarten with those really short lessons each day, your dog will only listen during those short lessons, right? Or the opposite. If things are very loose and casual at home and your dog is free all the time and, and you're trying to use these behaviors during the day before your dog is fully trained and then they're making all kinds of mistakes and you're not addressing them, that's not gonna get you there either.

And you either prioritize that training or you don't. And if you don't, then it will suffer. 'cause you can't have it both ways. If your dog doesn't get the right feedback from you, um, that will reflect and their behavior, right?

So I mean, I think it could be a strength, it could be an advantage to do it that way, but only if you're super committed to getting right on top of, um, things when your dog needs the feedback. 'cause if you don't tell them, then they don't know, right? Everything stays wishy-washy and negotiable or whatever because the feedback isn't coming in when it needs to because you're preoccupied with real life. So you can see how that's just much more difficult. But, um, yeah, that, that's, that's what I would say is, um, don't stay stuck in those short lessons.

Carve out the time. Say, okay, we're gonna take a few days. We're gonna teach you the place command. We're gonna take a few more days and we're gonna start working with distractions. And I'm just gonna start leaving you there and I'm gonna let life happen. And when life happens, if you need feedback, I'm gonna give it to you. I'm gonna tell you good. I'm gonna tell you no correction.

Uh, otherwise the dog just learns that there are, there is no feedback or there are no corrections when real life is happening. So you never, you never reach that goalpost. It just stays sloppy, right? Because it's sloppy training <laugh>. So, um, definitely takes a very high level of commitment to prioritize dog training over real life. Sometimes I think that's hard. And so my recommendation would just be to not do that and to keep your dog put away until you know they're at a point where you can trust them or you, or at least you're at a point where you just hold them accountable and reset them, right?

But when you're in this messy middle period where your dog needs a little bit of accountability, but they also need some guidance that's gonna be really hard to do during real life. So if it were me guys, use your kennel <laugh>. Hey guys, thanks for joining us today. I really hope you enjoyed the show. If there's a specific topic you'd like to hear discussed, you can send that to me directly via email or fan mail. Just jump down into the show notes. That information will be there for you. I really look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks for supporting the show and I look forward to next time.