Dog Training Q and A! 12/31/2020: Can I speak multiple languages to my dog? Is it okay if my dog watches TV? How do I keep my dog off my sofa? & More

This is a bonus episode: A recording of a live Q and A. Join Annie Grossman for a live Q and A most Thursdays. Sign up for the next one at http://schoolforthedogs.com/qanda or join in the School For The Dogs app at http://schoolforthedogs.com/community Have a question? Visit AnnieGrossman.com/ask or upload a recording at anchor.fm/dogs . In this episode, Annie answers questions from: -A bilingual dog owner who is confused about what language to use with his dog, and who gets angry when the dog goes on the couch -A dog owner whose older dog just died, leaving the younger one, a border collie, sort of depressed... can any thing be done? -A person who lives with a dog who is obsessed with watching TV. Can TV time actually help this dog be less reactive with other dogs? -A Great Dane owner whose dog attacks the door when people come in, or when he can see people through the glass --- Partial Transcript: [Intro and music] Annie: Now onto some of these questions. I have four questions here that I am going to try and answer. First question today comes from Luis, whose dog is named Luca. He is a 47 pound one year old American bulldog. They live in Phoenix. You can find them on Instagram, @nomadatemporal. Luis says: I just welcomed a beautiful dog into my life after we met at the shelter and I started listening to your podcast to get ready and train her. I think we are making progress and your tips have been super helpful. I’m having a hard time because my tendency is to get angry. For example, I don’t have a ton of money, and I got a set of couches as a gift from my family. So I’m trying to keep her off the couches. But when she gets on them, I respond in a way that is not helpful to training. I usually say no point to the ground, and sometimes she listens. Other times I have to physically take her down. Also Spanish is my first language. So it’s been hard to give her commands in English when my instinct is to say the first thing and it’s usually in Spanish. I know commands can be whatever. The people around are English speakers or bilingual. So I feel like training twice as much to teach her two commands for each. I love her, she’s American bulldog and we are learning from each other. Thank you for such a beautiful show and I hope I can support your work. That’s very nice. Alright. So a few things here, first of all, I really wouldn’t worry about what language that you’re speaking to Luca. You know, it’s funny with this because I really think that you know, most of the things we say to dogs they interpret like, remember like the parents in Charlie Brown? Like wa-wa-wa-wa-wa-wa. Sure, I think they understand tone to some extent, but I wouldn’t get too caught up in worrying about which language you’re using. Because you know, you can use gestures, you can teach using visual cues, for example. And when you do start to teach her specific behaviors, then you can start to think about being specific about what cues you use. And you might choose a visual cue instead of a verbal cue if you’re worried about going back and forth from one language to another. Full Transcript available at SchoolfortheDogs.com/Podcast Get full access to Don't Be a Dick to Your Dog at dogtraining.substack.com/subscribe