Professional Dog Training Instructor Module 8 Designing, Developing and Delivering Dog Training Sessions Lesson 1 Designing and Developing Dog Training Sessions
Introduction This lesson will take an in depth look at the early, but vitally important, stages of your career as a professional dog trainer. As you begin your career it is important that you start as you mean to go on. Taking the time to ensure that you have designed fit-for-purpose training sessions means that your clients are more likely to achieve what they desire to achieve, and will go on to recommend you to others. Developing upon your class design means that you will fully prepare for all eventualities prior to beginning to host your sessions. Developing your dog training sessions down to the finer details will ensure that your classes run smoothly and successfully, which is of course vital to ensure your clients leave happy. Later in this module we will look at designing and developing policies and procedures. This is essential from a business point of view so that your clients, and potential clients, are fully aware of where they stand in relation to interacting with your business, and it will also help to elevate any unnecessary stress that may arise if an event were to occur and you had not prepared a policy for such eventuality. We will then go on to look at the actual hosting aspect to dog training, your presentation skills, your communication skills, and your listening skills which are equally important. Finally, we will enjoy a busy practical training day where all learners will have ample opportunity to work closely with members of the public in a dog trainer capacity, both hosting a private one to one training session and hosting a group training class.
Goals of This Module By the completion of this module you will have gained a superior understanding in the intrinsic aspects that all combine to become a professional dog trainer. The role of the trainer requires the ability to both train and develop your human and dog clients, and both areas are equally important. You will have acquired the ability to design fantastic dog training courses and sessions which will maximise the success of both your client and their dog. You will further your ability to design fit for purpose client handouts that follow your training class. You will also be able to identify, explain, and work with different types of human learners. We will also focus on gaining your confidence in the instructor role, and increasing your practical experience in the role of the trainer.
Designing Dog Training Classes and One to One Training When working as a professional dog trainer it is likely that you will have two main streams of activity, one being group classes, and one being private one to ones. We will refer to both options as sessions throughout. Designing your training class and your one to ones is the first step in your journey of becoming a dog trainer, the better you design your session, the better the service you provide. There are several areas to consider during the designing of a dog training session. Know your Audience Whether visiting someone s home, or hosting a group class, it is wise to get to know your audience, both prior to your session and during the initial stages. You may have clients who English is not their first language. You may have clients who have mobility difficulties, you may have clients who are attending the session because they are at their wits end with their dog and so on, so getting to know your client in advance will allow you to prepare your content accordingly, know which angles need to be played up (empathy for a dog owner who is frustrated, ease of training for an owner with mobility issues and so on) and truly provide the best customer service possible. It is important to develop a habit of checking in with your clients, both group and one to one, to allow for the opportunity for them to ask more questions if they are confused. Regularly asking does this make sense? is a fantastic way to both ensure the client understands, and to evaluate your own performance and delivery. This will also allow those for who English is not their first language to ask for further explanation if needed. Age is important in both a group class and private session. If you have young children attending then it is important to design a session which will hold their attention, or at the very least prepare to offer them entertainment to distract them. Elderly clients may
find it more difficult to hear in a large group setting, and may become uncomfortable on their feet for too long. Ability level should be considered when designing your class. When designing an advanced class for clients who have all been with you before you can skip a lot of the basic steps and formal introductions, whereas a class filled with first time puppy owners may need even the most basic terminology and instructions explained to them clearly. Culturally different trends will be found from country to country, and even from social demographic to social demographic. A session may run very successfully in one local area, then moving the session to another part of town may result in a different audience with different demands, resulting in dissatisfied dog owners in the new area. Take the time to evaluate your audience for each session. To get to know your audience, the designing stage of your training session should also include information about your audience. A thorough enrolment questionnaire, and possibly a verbal conversation, should tell you all that you need to know about your audience. Including questions along the lines of Is English your first language? If no, please rate your level of fluency out of ten, with ten being excellent, Our training sessions often include quite a bit of movement, have you any mobility issues that we can assist you with to make training more successful for you?, and even down to Please list, in order of importance, what you want to achieve out of our training sessions. So, that you fully understand your audience.
Know your Content You should feel more than 100% confident on your knowledge and skill ability prior to hosting a training session. This means, if by surprise someone were to turn to you and say teach me how to x, y, or z you should be able to do so. Without taking time to try to remember, without reaching for notes. You should know the steps, and have the skill to carry out the training, with full clarity and clear steps. However, as a dog trainer, you should also know far more than your designed content. What this means is that when clients go off topic and ask you about other elements of dog training you should also know this content instantly, without revising notes. You must remember that you are providing a service, and you should provide a very good service, if you are charging people money. If you were to go to a restaurant and the chef couldn t provide you with a meal from the menu with a slight tweak you wouldn t be impressed, or if you went to the hair dresser and the stylist pulled out their notes to try to remember how to use the hair clippers you would look for your money back. As a dog trainer, your product is your knowledge. This is what the clients are buying, so it should be a pretty good product! Topics clients may ask you about include all the content we have covered in this course to date, from socialisation and habituation of puppies, to crate training, to greeting strange dogs and so on. There may be questions at time that are not what you are selling, and this is fine to leave unanswered, such as requests for agility training, or search and rescue training, and you can explain that these are specialist areas similar to asking a sushi chef to bake you a cake. It would also be wise to continue to develop your knowledge and skills to reach out to other areas of expertise, and continue to up-skill to specialise in other areas.
Of course, when clients ask you questions about another area of the pet industry, such as medical advice, or grooming advice it is important to encourage that client to seek the assistance of a professional of that trade. Behaviour questions are the ones where clients become confused and often frustrated, so when asked about more complex behaviour issues a go-to response may be something along the lines of I m not insured to give behaviourist advice, but I can give you the details of Mr. Smith, as a trainer I am only insured to give out training advice whereas this sounds more like a behaviourist would need to sit down with you and thoroughly investigate the issues to truly get to the bottom of it. I will send you through the contact information after this session. When ensuring that you know your content, you should also know multiple ways to train different behaviours, or multiple ways to explain different advice, so that you can customise your training to different situations. Previously in this course we covered a lot of common dog training material, though the list of training topics is endless, so you should continue to develop your ability to use your understanding of learning theory to develop new training plans. This could include muzzle training, methods to deal with attention seeking, training exercises to increase a dog focus and self-control, calm in car training, target training, grooming exercises, settle training, go to mat training and so on. Also, remembering to work on your ability to increase distance, duration and distraction so that you can then help your clients. As a dog trainer, you need to build your experience with implementing your training plans so that you know from past cases that the training you are designing will be effective. Spending time at local animal charities helping to train their dogs will also build your experience with dogs that are more distracted than most pets, so do make sure that you get your training hat on, and get out there to work with lots and lots of dogs.
Know your Resources We have looked at lesson plans before. A good lesson plan is critical in designing a successful training session, partly because it will force you to think about all aspects of training. This includes resources. Of course, resources will vary between group classes and one to ones, though there will be some similarities. Will you need certain environmental resources, such as suitable flooring, heating, light, parking and more? This will also be relevant if you are hosting the one to one. Will you be providing the dogs with food rewards? Will you cater for different doggie diets? What about human allergies? Your clients may arrive without the correct leads and collars, will you have more? Are you going to look at up-selling training equipment? Will you have them in stock? Will you be able to take card payment? Will you have change for cash purchases? Perhaps your training area for a group class is very large would a microphone and speaker system benefit? Are you teaching a class with some reactive or easily distracted dogs? Are visual barriers going to help your class? If you are going in to someone s home, what will you bring? Again, will you have products? leads or collars that you recommend? Are you going to bring food rewards or toys? Is your phone fully charged and have you safety measures in place? Did you bring a map or satellite navigation to ensure you get to the home on time? Will you wear a watch to ensure you manage your time correctly during your training session? When attending other trainer s classes, what did you see and what do you like? Continue to read about other training methods, watch trainers online, learn from your peers to ensure that your classes are successful.
Know your Risks Dog training as an industry comes with so many more risks to human and animal safety than working in a bank! It s important to remain aware of the risks involved and to work hard on minimising the risks during your design stage of your dog training sessions. Potential risks are everywhere, but below are just some that you should put risk reduction procedures, and what to do if plans in place for. We will explore policies and procedures later in this module. Dog-dog risks cross contamination of diseases fighting impregnation(!) causing dog-dog fearful behaviours Dog-human risks Bite from client s dog to trainer Bite from dog to another class attendee Trips from dog getting underfoot Dog leash (particularly flexi leash) tangling up a person as dog moves around Class member (particularly children) may mistreat another clients dog Slips, trips and falls, particularly strong dogs pulling handler over Injuries from mis-handling of leash
Trainer risks Victim of crime particularly if alone during training session Injury or bite from dog Slips, trips and falls Environmental risks Fire Electrical burns Injury from sharp objects, and location specific injuries. Prepare for Unexpected Events When designing your class or one to ones take time to predict, and prepare for, any unexpected events. Will you have your contact details of clients to hand always in case your car breaks down on route to training session? Will you have a spare pair of keys to access your training centre if you lose your keys? Do you have first aid training should a client or dog become injured or unwell during your class? Have you policies in place for clients mistreating a dog during your session? If only one client shows up for a group class will you have enough material to cover with the one client? If the power goes at your building do you have torches or lighting to the exits? Should dogs fight during your training session how will you handle this?
Know your Progression It is much easier to retain an existing client than to source new clients. Once your class finishes, what more do you have to offer them? Will you have an advanced obedience class? Will you invite a one to one client to agility classes? Will you encourage agility clients to participate in competitions? It s important for your business to integrate progression into your development plan so that you can structure sessions accordingly. Design your Retention How do you follow up with your clients? Do you send feedback forms to find out the strengths and weaknesses of your class? Will you follow up with a phone call two weeks after a one to one to see how the training is going, or if the client would like a follow up session? All of this is important in retaining clients, building a longterm relationship with the client, and ensuring customer satisfaction.
Know your Industry While it is important that you don t get drawn in to giving advice on other areas of the industry (veterinary, breeding, grooming and so on) you must also know your industry and have the answers to many dog-related questions that you should be up to speed with. This means staying up to date with legislation, industry trends, TV shows covering dog matters and so on. You must be able to educate your clients on all their legal responsibilities such as dogs wearing ID tags, the need for a dog licence, having their dog microchipped, breed specific legislation and not allowing their dogs to roam. You should be able to inform your clients about vaccinations, neutering, regulating their dogs weight, promoting good welfare, understanding different breed traits and so on.
Getting Started! When designing your training plan, you must keep the owner-dog relationship as paramount. This includes having empathy for pet owners who have become frustrated with their pet, empowering owners who feel useless, and praising owners for their achievements. You can do this by measuring progress so that the owner can see their progression. This could be increasing the time for which a barking dog stays quiet, counting the number of times the dog responds to the owner s cues, or perhaps scaling how the owner feels their bond with their dog is out of 10. Next you need to ensure you have the skill and knowledge to train all the behaviours that your client may want to cover. This may include the below, plus more. It s important that you discuss the clients aims in detail prior to your training session so you can be prepared. Socialisation and habituation predominantly with puppies but many clients will also want to work on helping their older dogs to interact nicely with other dogs, or learn to be perfectly OK with a new experience (perhaps going on boats). If the client says the dog needs socialisation because they don t like dogs, then question this more as it may need to be referred to a behaviour consultant. Handling exercises this may be a dog that will require lots of veterinary handling for an injury or illness, or perhaps a dog that will be getting groomed quite a bit later in life. If the client says the dog has shown aggression or distress during handling, then in this case refer this on. Bite inhibition this may be a young dog or puppy that uses its mouth during play, so you will need to train that dog an alternative behaviour. If the client says the dog is biting investigate this closely to see if this is more serious than puppy mouthing.
Aggression prevention guarding behaviours whether of areas, food or people, can all be prevented through early training. If the dog is already showing guarding behaviours, refer on. Toilet training in young dogs can be done by a trainer if it is an older dog you would need to look at medical influences so this may need a behaviour consultant. Agility and games sniffer games, trick training, advanced obedience and agility training are all fun behaviours that you can work on with your client particularly with children, or owners who have become frustrated, so that they can have a positive relationship with the dog. Polite behaviours around the front door, greeting other dogs, greeting their people, going to a settle mat while humans are eating, remaining calm and settled in the car, and so on. Basic obedience behaviours such as sit, down, stay, leave it, drop, wait, watch me, touch, loose leash, recall, stand, spin, paw, no jumping, and so on. You should have fully mastered several methods to train each of these behaviours to ensure that you can work with dogs and humans of different abilities. Nuisance barking mental stimulation, physical exercise, looking at the motivation for the barking, exploring alternative behaviours and management techniques, training shush, and so on. New baby preparing the dog for the arrival of a new baby well in advance and if the dog appears to have any behaviour issues you would need to recommend the clients seek the help of a behaviour consultant before the baby arrives. Separation related behaviours will often need to be referred on.
Behaviour Training Steps Give the behaviour a name, so that your client will know what you are working on. Explain the goal. What will it look like when the dog has achieved this learning? Have your clients think about the benefits. You can ask your client(s) to think about why this behaviour will make their life better, and can have some examples ready too so that you will get your client on board with the training. Break the training down in to steps, ideally you want to look at three steps from novice to trained dog sometimes it may be more than three training steps for more complex behaviours but three progression steps are often best to ensure that your client can follow without becoming overwhelmed. Once you have explained the three steps, go back to step one. Demonstrate this stage with a live dog. Some trainers use their own dog, others take a client s dog, or in a one to one session you will use the clients dog. Recap, and leave with a TAG point. Here you can ask your clients to repeat back the step to you beneficial during one to one training. Next, allow your clients practice under your watchful eye. Some clients prefer you to do this from a distance, while others want you right up close, you will get a feel for this with practice and remember it s best to adjust your style for different clients. You will often need to step in and show the client again with their own dog. If the dog is nervous of strangers don t push them, demonstrate with an air dog! Once the client(s) have had a few minutes to practice, gather their attention again. Find out if any clients had any questions. Move on to stage two of the training. Recap verbally Demonstrate Leave the clients with a TAG point And repeat above. Repeat with stage 3. Often your clients may need to practice, practice, practice before moving on to the later stages and this is fine, just integrate this in to your lesson plans for the whole course / follow up one to one session.
Writing your Course As always, when writing a course, you will begin with your lesson plan. When designing your lesson plan make sure that the objectives of each step are clear, that the client will know WHY they are doing what they do, and that they will be able to follow the steps without too much difficulty. A mistake often made is that the clients are given too much to work on and become confused with the institutions, so when designing your lesson plan it would be beneficial to include a TAG point with each instruction level. As the client begins working on the small step and achieves that you can then give them the next tag line. In a group class this can be done individually as you go around the room to assist one to one. Your clients should be given handouts to follow at home, so part of the course design should include homework design. For a one to one session it is likely that you will create a complete report for them to follow, but this can be an edited version of pre-made handouts and instruction plans. Your video skills that have been developed during this course should be used to create visual homework too, as your clients learning styles will vary. When creating, your handouts make sure that they are clear and easy to follow. Have a non-doggie friend read over the handouts and ask them to ensure that the steps are not missing any information or using complex language, or even too much information. TAG point your handouts too Pictures in handouts are always more visually appealing for clients, and more likely to go on the fridge free advertising to house guests! Don t forget your business details logo and contact information should be clear and on each page. Clients might pass the information on to friends and family so they should also be able to contact you later! Keep the style of all your handouts similar, and tie it in with your brand appearance font, colour scheme and so on should be the same to allow for branding and consistency amongst your material.
Whatever software you use to create your documents, find out more about how to use this software to the best of your ability. YouTube tutorials can show you how to integrate pictures into your posters with a nice border, blend the photo you re your text so that there are not big blank white spaces, and always aim to keep handouts to one page per behaviour so that they are visually neat and can be put on the fridge!