Any time you are working on a specific goal for your dog it is helpful to keep a diary on the subject. That goal may be potty training, diminishing fear reactions, or a click-a-trick journal.

Keeping a journal  keeps you focused on what your dog needs help with and what stage of learning they are at.

Dogs learn in three stages; Introduction, Generalization, and Maintenance.

The Introduction stage is of course, where you first  show the dog what it is you want. This usually involves lots of treat and luring the dog into the position you are looking for through shaping the behavior. You can move on to generalization  when the dog can perform the cue 9/10 times with  no distractions or changes to the environment. During Generalization you start to ask for the behavior in new locations, with small distractions or maybe you cue the behavior while sitting or laying on the floor. The point is, you change 1 thing at a time and teach the dog that the cue hasn’t changed even if the environment has! Once the dog can handle many distractions or changes to the environment you are ready for the the maintenance stage.  During Maintenance you start a variable reinforcement schedule and go back to the cues intermittently to make sure the dog does not forget the cue.

Keeping a journal while training a behavior i a great way to remember what part of which cue you are on, especially if you have more than one dog!

For potty Training the journal can be extremely helpful to remind you when the last time you let the puppy outside for a break. I have found that most dogs potty train very easily and only make mistakes 9/10 times while learning. Unfortunately that 10th time you end up having to clean up a nasty mess. So I recommend to all my clients, to get that last 10%, keep the journal, this keeps fresh in your mind how long the puppy can last before they need to get outside.

As the puppy starts to trust the schedule he will find it a lot easier to “hold it” because he knows that outdoors is coming soon. Puppies who don’t have a set schedule and don’t know when their next break is coming have a much harder time getting into the habit of only going outside.