Years ago, I went through my website looking to remove every mention of ‘obedience training.’ That was a strange thing for a dog trainer to do at the time, as most of my clients requested ‘obedience training,’ and most trainers offered ‘obedience training’ classes. It is a common vernacular, but it is not accurate.  

I love words because they help us communicate with each other. I try to be precise with the words I choose. Being clear is very important if we want to communicate well. 

Since we are Human, our primary way of passing and receiving information is through words or sounds. But dogs primarily rely on body language to understand each other, not sound. This causes a problem for our communication. 

Humans think communication means words, so we focus on giving orders or commands. When the dogs comply or are obedient to our requests, it seems we are ‘communicating.’ However, this is one-sided, and communication must go both ways; we must try to practice our nonverbal communication skills because dogs also communicate, and they communicate nonverbally. 

Nonverbal communication is part of human language, but our nonverbals support our spoken words. We are all very good at reading human body language, proving that we have the equipment to understand nonverbal communication. So, how do we learn to practice those skills with dogs? How do we learn to read and understand our dog’s body language? For me, I learned from others. Most people learn these skills from others. 

When I practice canine communication or dog training with clients, we work on these skills together. The SuperCycles Canine Communication Program allows us to rehearse and be clear when communicating with dogs and reading, understanding, and acting on their nonverbal communication. 

-We become consciously aware of our dog’s temperament, energy level, and intentions through their behavior. 

-We watch the dogs and discuss what they are doing and what their actions mean in real-time. We practice this until we become fluent, reading, understanding, and acting on their actions quickly enough to have meaningful interactions with our friends, and our dogs. 

Canine/Human communication is hard to explain in a blog because at least half of it cannot be written down, and the things that can be written are easily misunderstood. For example, many people understand a wagging tail as a sign of a happy dog. The problem is that unhappy dogs may also wag their tails. As we study how dogs communicate, we learn how to view their actions in context and, in so doing, learn to distinguish between a happy wag and an unhappy wag. This is the real work of dog training.

However, ‘obedience training’ is a common search term. I understand how SEO works, so I recently added the word ‘obedience’ back to my website. But Communication is the key.

If you want to improve your communication skills with your dog, contact us today! We are glad to share what we have learned.