What to Expect in a Puppy Training Class
Start your pup’s journey on the right paw. In these private lessons you learn the management and training skills for a safe and happy home life together.
Your dog trainer Rachel uses humane, positive reinforcement for crate training, leash skills, and puppy obedience. Your pup gets motivated and rewarded for good behavior, which keeps training sessions engaging for both of you.
What’s Included in Puppy Private Lessons?
Your training plan is built around your puppy, and may include potty training, socialization, nipping, mouthing, chewing, jumping, coming when called (recall), crate training, mat training, and resource guarding.
Your pup is introduced to basic commands that give you a way to communicate with each other, and learns the leash walking skills that make walks around the neighborhood something to look forward to.
Why Early Training Matters
Puppy training sets the foundation for a lifetime of positive interactions with people and other dogs. The world your puppy needs to feel at ease in is specific: for many Bethesda puppies that means an elevator, a lobby, delivery people at the door, and other dogs passing close on a narrow sidewalk.
Calm, positive experiences with those everyday sights and sounds, early on, shape how your dog handles them for years. Socialization during puppy lessons is about building exactly that comfort.
Training the Whole Family, Puppy Included
Lessons happen in your home, across Bethesda, Chevy Chase, and the rest of the service area, and everyone who lives with the puppy is welcome to take part, children included. A puppy learns the house rules fastest when the whole house teaches them the same way.
Before Your First Lesson
Check vaccination guidance with your veterinarian before training begins, and start noting when accidents, nipping, and crate trouble actually happen. Those details help Rachel build the right plan at the free phone consultation.
Puppy Training Questions Owners Ask
What can a puppy training plan cover?
Potty training, socialization, nipping and mouthing, chewing, jumping, recall, crate training, mat training, and resource guarding. The plan is customized to your puppy rather than a fixed syllabus.
Is my puppy’s nipping and chewing normal?
Puppies explore the world with their mouths, so nipping, mouthing, and chewing are among the most common things a puppy plan works on. Training channels it toward things your puppy is allowed to chew.
What training methods do you use?
Humane, positive reinforcement only. Good behavior gets rewarded. We never use prong collars, shock collars, or anything that works through pain or fear.
Can my children take part in the lessons?
Yes. Lessons include the whole household, with children coached at an age-appropriate level, so your puppy learns that the same rules apply to everyone.
When should we start?
Early training builds the foundation everything else sits on, so it is worth talking to Rachel soon after your puppy comes home. The free phone consultation is where you work out the right starting point for your pup’s age.
My dog is past the puppy stage. Where do I look?
Our dog obedience training classes cover the same foundation for adolescent and adult dogs.
