Cultivate the Calm

My approach to creating calm, tuned in and non reactive dogs on the structured leash walk is by having a great communication system (our ecollar training approach!) that I use to correct reactive behaviour and poor choices and to cultivate a calm mindset and polite heeling instead. It’s important that we teach the dog what behaviour we want AND also what behaviour we don’t want. It’s not enough to simply reward good behaviour while trying to ignore bad behaviour because the bad behaviour is often very self reinforcing plus the dog assumes that her human endorses her reactivity and shenanigans when it’s not corrected... from the dog’s perspective, the absence of ‘no’ means ‘yes’. So we must be very comprehensive and well rounded by presenting our dogs with all the information and guidance they need to learn how to successfully walk on leash!