Want to learn more about clicker training for puppies? In this video, I’m going to go over how to clicker train your puppy and WHY a clicker can be more effective than verbal praise.
Now first, let’s talk about the BENEFIT of a clicker. The clicker is a tool to help you communicate with your pup the precise moment they performed the behavior you’re looking for. For example, if you ask your pup to sit, if you say good dog and then give them a treat, they could’ve looked LEFT/RIGHT and by the time they get the treat, it’s a little unclear what they’re receiving a treat for. Are they getting the treat for looking at your treat pouch, or are they getting the treat for sitting? The clicker is going to help communicate with your pup exactly what you’re looking for.
The second reason a clicker is great is that it’s much faster to CLICK versus use a verbal marker like the word “YES.” Our thumbs are typically quicker than our tongues, and the better your timing, the faster your dog is going to learn.
Of course, a short verbal marker can still be effective (like the word YES) as long as you’re saying it consistently.
Alright so now that you know WHY a clicker is awesome, how do we train our puppies?
Our puppies don’t automatically come conditioned to know what the click means. In the following steps, I go over how to condition your dog, but also, how you (the human) can get used to this new apparatus.
Step 1 – Practicing timing and treat delivery without your dog
Without your dog present, practice clicking and then delivering a treat. The clicker should act as a bridge between when your pup performed the behavior and the reward is delivered. It’s super important that you can deliver treats consistently every time without dropping and fumbling getting your treats out.
That’s why I recommend a magnetic treat pouch for easy simple access to your treats. If you start dropping a lot of treats, you’re going to start unintentionally training your pup to sniff between every rep to double-check you didn’t drop any treats.
In fact, one of my clients’ dogs literally went to check the floor BEFORE looking at the owner’s hands, because the owner had unintentionally trained the dog to do that by constantly dropping treats!
Step 2 – is conditioning the dog to understand that this sound means a treat is coming. You’ll hear a lot of trainers calling this “Charging the Clicker”.
You’ll know the clicker is charged once your dog looks up at you to figure out where the treat is upon hearing the clicker.
Step 3 – Start training with something easy
Start with something easy that your pup might already know like Sit or Look at Me. If your puppy doesn’t know anything, TOUCH is a great cue to get things going.
Keep practicing and you’ll be ready to start using your clicker for more complicated behaviors as well