Games are really useful for teaching your dog new skills in a way that is fun and enjoyable for both of you. We can use games for reactive dogs to help them learn to disengage from other dogs, people or whatever they may find stressful. They can help your dog learn to relax around their triggers and choose to engage with you instead of other behaviours like lunging or barking. In this post I’ll share some of our favourite training games for reactive dogs.
Games for Reactive Dogs- Find it!
Teaching your dog to sniff out and find scattered treats is really useful. Firstly, it gets your dog using their nose and sniffing is a calming behaviour. It can also be a helpful distraction for your dog from potential triggers like other dogs going past. You can use Find It to help your dog calm down after a big reaction too. Here’s how to play:
- Whilst your dog is looking at you, throw a treat on the ground and say ‘find it!’, allowing them to see where you’re throwing it.
- After a few repetitions, you can scatter a few more treats onto the ground whilst using the ‘find it’ cue.
- Once your dog is used to the ‘find it’ cue, you can then scatter treats in environments that are going to be harder for them to focus in to help build calm. This could be at the park or beach, or close to their triggers.
- If you’ve played ‘Find it’ several times and then you find your dog is unable to put their nose down to find their treats, you are likely to close to something they find stressful or very exciting. Add some distance from the trigger and try again.
Catch
Teaching your dog to catch treats is another fun, easy game that keeps your dog engaged with you. To catch the treat your dog has to be watching you and keeping an eye on your movements. It’s another handy game to play when triggers are going past and you want to keep your dog engaged with you. If you’ve never taught your dog to catch treats before, here’s how to get started:
- Whilst your dog is looking at you, say ‘Catch!’ and then give it a second before you toss a treat into the air towards your dog.
- If they do catch the treat, great! Keep practising and build up the difficulty by playing in different and more challenging environments.
- If they don’t catch it, just keep practising. There’s no real downside to this game! If they don’t catch it, they can just sniff it out on the ground instead. Most dogs get the hang of this game pretty quickly!
Pattern Games for Reactive Dogs
Pattern games are particularly useful for reactive dogs as they give the dog a reliable and predictable structure to work with. To learn more about pattern games, check out the Control Unleashed! Series of books by Leslie McDevitt. I use pattern games extensively as part of my one to one training with reactive dogs and their people. They’re adaptable for all dogs, easy to implement and highly effective for helping dogs relax around their triggers.
Up Down
This is an easy game that helps your dog engage with you instead of other dogs and people in the environment. It encourages your dog to practise checking in with you and gets them using their nose too. Like all training and games, you’ll want to start playing at home in a low distraction environment your dog feels confident in. You can then build up to places with more going on around them. Here’s how to play.
- You’ll want to have some treats ready in your hand with your dog standing in front of you. As soon as they look up at you, you can mark this moment with your marker word or clicker. If you’ve not used a marker word or clicker before, simply say ‘good’.
- As soon as you’ve marked, clicked or said ‘good’, drop a treat on the floor in front of your dog. As soon as they’ve found the treat and looked back up at you, go again!
- Everytime your dog looks up at you and you drop a treat, you are building on their ability to engage with you. If your dog is struggling to look up at you and is checking out what’s going on around them instead, you’ll want to go back and practise somewhere that’s quieter. Practise at home, in the garden and then around the front of your home. This can help to build a bridge between low and high distraction environments.
- Set a timer for a minute and see how many times you can play Up Down in that minute. The more times you can play, the stronger your dogs focus and engagement with you is.
What next?
- Looking for more help with your reactive dog? Contact us to arrange in person or online training.
- Read more blog posts here.
- Perfect Recall: Teaching your dog to come back when called every time. Our guide is free to download when you join our email list- sign up here.