Lay Down
New term:
Shaping - breaking down a command and its resulting behavior into small increments, and reinforcing each incremental step until you've achieved the desired result. This will be used for most commands after your dog has mastered sit, touch, and look-at-me. By reinforcing your dog when they are getting closer to the desired behavior you are allowing them to learn and think through the process in a healthy way. This also allows us to teach commands like "lay down," or "roll over" without physically manipulating the animal.
1. Put your dog into a sitting position, stand in front of them with a treat in your hand and let them smell it. the treat in your hand will be our "lure." You should have trained your dog to perform both "touch-target" and "sit" before attempting this command.
Note: If bending your back like in the picture is too difficult for you, you can start by sitting on the floor or in a chair to train this command.
2. With your treat still in your hand, slowly bring your hand towards the ground. this movement should be directly downward from the front of their snout. Your pup should begin following the treat downwards with their nose. Say "Yes" and then reward as they begin to follow the treat downward with their head. this is the first incremental shaping step. Don't use a verbal command yet
3. Continue to shape the command and rewarding with a treat when they get close to the position we want. In this picture Raven is learning how to do the down command, and when she arches her back and starts putting her heard down, say "Yes" immediately (while she is still in this position) and then reward. Each subsequent time, try to get your pup to move slightly closer to the end result.
4. Continue to shape the command saying "Yes" each time your dog is getting closer to the end result. When your hand gets to the point where it is just above the ground point to the ground with your index finger touching the ground where you would like your dog to be laying down.
5. Practice steps 2-4 until your dog is reliably laying all the way down. Once she is reliably laying with her stomach on the ground when you move your finger to the ground, you may add the verbal command "Down." you should be saying it at the same time as you are pointing to the ground.
6. Now that your dog can perform the command with you bending over, we need to shape them to do the command from a standing position. Practice slowly straightening your back while your pup is still laying down. Try to "Yes" as late as possible, if your dog sits up or moves say "nuh-uh" and try again.
7. Final desired position. Standing upright and pointing to the ground.