Obedience Class descriptions

Puppy Kindergarten  the class is for dogs 4 – 8 months of age and having all initial shots completed.  Each 1 hour class will introduce you to the positive and motivational methods of training and communicating with your dog.  You will learn to develop your puppy into a well round adult through mastering the Beginning Basic Obedience commands (sit, down, stay, come, etc.).  We will also work with you on “Puppy Problems” (mouthing, jumping, etc.) in addition to introducing Basic Beginning Agility and Socialization with dogs the same age.

 Beginning Obedience  the class will help develop your dog’s self confidence and enable them to work under various distractions.  Each 45 minute class will help develop a strong working and relationship bond between you and  your dog.  We will build upon the Basic Obedience commands (sit, down, stay, come, etc) and help you develop the dog’s attention skills.  We will work on special issue, such as pulling, lunging, barking, etc.

 Advance Beginner Obedience  this class will help strengthen your dog’s self confidence and control.   While working on long stays and introduction of various distractions we will help you handle and situation that may arise while walking or working with your dog.  The introduction of basic agility obstacles will enable you to develop voice control over your dog and strengthen their attention skills. 

 Novice Obedience   at this level of Obedience training we will help you get ready to enter the world of working competition with your dog.  Through developing your dog’s attention skills we will work on developing a strong working team and competition required skills.   This class will set you up to move into areas such as Obedience Competition, Rally Competition and Agility Competition.

Competition Obedience Classes  this class will aid the development of your working team at all advance levels of Obedience Competition.  The knowledge and fine tuning of the required skills, such as jumping, retrieving, attention and out of sight stays, will be achieve in these classes.   At each step the level of distraction will be increased.

Agility Class descriptions

Beginners class for dogs that have never seen equipment.  Handlers can be familiar with equipment.  Introduction to the equipment, how to teach your dog to jump, weaves, contact obstacles will to shown to your dog.  Handlers will learn how to safely train the dogs to navigate around the obstacles.  Obedience for agility will be addressed, sit, stay, come which is crucial to training agility.  How to use food and toys in the training of agility will be shown to the handlers and dogs.

Beyond Beginner class for dogs who have already taken the Beginners class, this is continuation of the skills you have learned in beginners and we will build on the foundation.  New obstacles will be introduced.  Dogs and handler will learn better performance of the obstacles.  Basic handling will be introduced as the teams advance.

Advanced Beginner – once dog and handler have completed the beginner 2 class, we continue to show the dogs more of the equipment.  The dogs will learn how to safely do the obstacles.  We will begin to work on handling and how to get your dogs from one obstacle to the other.  Handling, front and rear crosses, why we do them are addressed in this class.

Novice class - for dogs who are familiar with all equipment.  Weaves can be open, not straight; see-saw can be low.  Handler has an idea regarding contacts and has criteria on the performance of them.  Learning to handle dogs to successfully complete the sequence will be a high priority in this class.

Competition- Full size course is run, dogs do closed weaves.  Courses are more difficult and the sequences will challenge the dog and handler team to work at the Advanced/Open and Masters/Excellent level.

Rally Class Descriptions

Obedience for Rally 1 the class will be geared to the novice competitor who wants to improve their on-leash heeling and the advanced competitor who needs reasonable attention & reasonable off-leash heeling skills to succeed. Will be working on heeling with attention from sign to sign, left & right turns, 360's & 270's. Working thru distractions & introducing light proofing. Working on a reliable recall & set up, keeping the dog happy & motivated in the ring. Some sign work including introduction to pivots & back ups. Introduction to attention, heeling with attention, straight sits/downs, reliable "come" commands, novice & some advanced signs.

Obedience for Rally 2  Pre-requisite is Obedience for Rally 1. Continue attention work, heeling with attention between stations, begin off leash heeling, light proofing, advanced & excellent signs.

RALLY BEGINNER CLASS- Learn proper footwork & execution of novice signs. Basic obedience necessary...walk on leash, sit, down. This is a set of 6 classes to introduce you to AKC Rally. You will learn the first 31 Rally signs. These are the signs that are used at the Novice level, and we will work up to doing full Novice courses.

You will learn how points are deducted and the requirements needed to qualify at trials. We will go over rules and regulations and learn how trials are conducted. Dogs should have basic obedience skills to start Rally. Rally reinforces obedience training and produces confidence in both dogs and handlers.  Rally is a stepping stone to formal obedience and also agility. For advanced dogs and handlers it is great fun and a way of adding more titles to your dog.

RALLY NOVICE RUN THRUS- Rally Novice is the 1st level of AKC Rally. It is done on lead. I will set up a Novice course and you have the option of going thru the course once, twice or three times. I will change several of the signs for the 2nd or 3rd run thru. I will watch as you go thru the course and offer suggestions or corrections as needed.

With proficiency at this level you can compete and earn the Rally Novice title (RN). In order to compete in AKC Rally you must have a dog that is registered with the AKC or have an ILP registration with the AKC (ILPs are for dogs that are recognized by the AKC but do not have AKC papers).  There are other venues for competition if you have a mixed breed dog. Most are similar to AKC Rally with varying changes to some of the signs and regulations.

RALLY ADVANCED RUN THRUS-  Rally Advanced is the 2nd level of AKC Rally. It is done off lead and includes 1 jump. I will set up an Advanced course and you have the option of going thru the course once, twice or three times. I will change several of the signs for the 2nd or 3rd run thru. I will also add Excellent signs (3rd level of AKC Rally) for anyone competing at that level. I will watch as you go thru the course and offer suggestions or corrections as needed.

With proficiency at this level you can compete and earn the Rally Advanced title (RA), or the Rally Excellent title (RE). In order to compete in AKC Rally you must have a dog that is registered with the AKC or have an ILP registration with the AKC (ILPs are for dogs that are recognized by the AKC but do not have AKC papers). There are other venues for competition if you have a mixed breed dog. Most are similar to AKC Rally with varying changes to some of the signs and regulations.

Competition Obedience Run Thru's

COMPETITION OBEDIENCE RUN THRU'S will be geared to keep your dog fully motivated, focused and ready for distractions that will be at a real trial.  Attention, attitude and accuracy will be worked on with clear step -by- step instruction. It will cover handler’s and dog’s footwork as well as what to do between exercises to keep your dogs attention. You will work on focus up close and at a distance with motivational games.  Each exercise will be covered with distractions and various proofs will be covered. Sits and downs will be worked extensively with proofing and longer times. We will work on polishing dog and handler for the ring.

 Attention agility handlers:  Obedience can help you with your agility; teach your dog to work better off-lead. whether you have no start line stay or your dog won't get off the start line. Faster recalls and faster sits and downs on the table. Help your dog be handler focused as well as obstacle focused.  Help your dog know what a proof is and keep his attention on what you are asking them to do.