Ep181 Who Does The Teaching?

Who does the teaching? That's an interesting question, isn't it? So if we have a dog that has trouble with grooming, that has some difficulty, is showing some behavior that we do not want, is it the groomer who does the training? Is it a trainer, a behavior consultant? Is it an owner? Let's talk about all of our options this week.

The full transcript!

[00:00:00] Chrissy: Episode 180 1. Who does the teaching? That's an interesting question, isn't it? So if we have a dog that has trouble with grooming, that has some difficulty, is showing some behavior that we do not want, is it the groomer who does the training? Is it a trainer, a behavior consultant? Is it an owner? Let's talk about all of our options this week.

[00:00:20] You're listening to the Creating Great Grooming Dog Show. I'm Chrissy Newmeyer Smith. I'm a master groomer behavior specialist. I'm a certified professional groomer, a certified behavior consultant for canines, a certified professional dog trainer and instructor at Whole Pet Grooming Academy, and the owner of Happy Critters in Nashua, New Hampshire.

[00:00:37] And this my friends and colleagues, is the show where grooming and training. . So let's get into this a little bit today because I think that, , we all start wondering, well, where will this dog learn a new skill if it comes down to training? And I know some of you are kind of new to that idea that we can teach the dogs to be good for it.

[00:00:56] And I hear you. , it was not always what I thought either, but we can, we can teach them to be good for it. So who does? , so my quick answer is that I think it needs to be collaborative. I think that it's more than just one person who does that . I think that that's something that we need to do as a group.

[00:01:13] And what I mean by that is there is some stuff that the Grimmer is gonna need to do differently. , there's stuff that the owners should be sent home with also, and we often will have to work with a trainer or with somebody else in that dog's life also. Now, the reason. Let's get into just a little bit about why, , I hear groomers say things like, oh, but owners will just make it worse if they go home, they go home with the owner and the owner's gonna make it worse.

[00:01:42] And let me explain what's going on there because I hear you, I hear what you're saying, and I know that owners can definitely make it worse. But what a lot of non trainers don't realize is that dog training is all about talking to owners. Dog training's all about teaching people [00:02:00] and it's really a unique skillset.

[00:02:02] , it takes a long time to learn how to effectively teach people. And so what do you need to be able to teach people, ? You need to have them understand how to do something that's important. And it may seem really obvious, but think about how many of our owners have trouble brush. Even if they have the right tool, have trouble brushing, even if they have the right tool, and they have been shown a few times, they're still having trouble just brushing, which you would think, but you brush your own hair.

[00:02:32] How could that be hard? But it is. Okay. So our owners need to understand how to do a thing, and that's where dog trainers are very good at helping owners understand. Here's another part for owners owners need to understand why. Why does he need to know how to do this?

[00:02:52] Why is this gonna make a difference for this dog? Why is it gonna make a difference for them? Why, why are we even spending the time on it? Because if they don't understand why, then they might be stressing their dog out at home trying to just touch 'em with stuff. The classic example is the person who's been massaging his feet.

[00:03:13] Oh, I just know the, the trainer said we should touch his feet a lot. , and actually non groomers don't really understand the purpose of foot touching, which is why we get a lot of dogs who have a lot of behavior problems, even though people have been touching their feet. Because it is not enough. , it's not extensive enough.

[00:03:33] It does not translate to nail trimming directly. So it's not a bad. , but it's just sort of like the, the very bare minimum . So they need to understand why. They need to know why. Why are we doing a thing? What are we working toward, so we have the how, how are we gonna do it? The why are we doing it?

[00:03:52] What are we working toward? Like what does the finished product look like? And that's part of goal setting,[00:04:00] ? What does the finished product look like? What do I want your dog to be able to. during the next grooming appointment. Is it, maybe it's standing still on a table, maybe it's being brushed. , maybe it's, touching a tail.

[00:04:16] What is it that we actually want this to look like when we see this dog next that gives an owner the, the idea of like, what would they need to teach now? The other pa