[nagdu] problems with new dog

[Julie J]

Cheryl,

I use primarily clicker training with my dogs, at least in the beginning. 
The basic premise is that you click when the dog has done the desired 
behavior and immediately follow it up with a treat.  Typically the treat is 
food, but it could be a quick toss of a ball or something else that the dog 
highly values.  the treat must be more valuable than the reward of the 
unwanted behavior.

My approach is to control the situation so that it isn't overwhelming for 
the dog.  I want the dog to succeed, so I make the situation just difficult 
enough for learning to occur, but not so difficult as to cause the dog to 
display the unwanted behavior.  Set the dog up for success.

The first thing I'd do is to find a group of people who are willing to help, 
a youth group, church group, neighborhood kids, whoever you can get to help 
you out in exchange for cookies or something.   Next I'd ask them to walk by 
and pay no attention to the dog.  I use clicker so I'd click and treat every 
time someone walked by, assuming that the dog stayed calm with feet on the 
ground.  If you don't use clicker just a treat will probably work.  I'd 
repeat this until she looks to you when someone walks by.  then perhaps have 
the person stop at the gate and then move on without entering.   Then the 
person could lift the latch, close it again and move on without entering. 
then the person could step inside and immediately turn around and leave.  If 
she gets too excited it's a sign that you've moved ahead too quickly back up 
to the previous step or break it down into more steps.   You are going to 
need to have a lot of people to practice with so that she generalizes the 
behavior to *all* people.

Some other ideas...keep her on a leash and under your direct supervision 
until she has solidly learned what you expect.   This is the method that I 
used with my overenthusiastic greeter.  I don't get too many visitors, but 
when someone would approach the house I'd take Monty to a different room 
while another family member answered the door.  I'd move forward with him a 
few feet at a time, waiting each time until he was calm and able to follow 
my direction to sit or down.  Then we'd move forward a bit more and repeat 
one or two quick obedience commands.  By the time we got into the living 
room he was usually calm enough to be let off the leash and greet the 
visitor, if the visitor was up for visiting.   If at any time during that 
process he got crazy, we backed up and tried it again.

HTH
Julie