Hand signal commands

[Zeela]

Today at lunch, I didn't say a word, just hand signaled for her to come to sit and to give high 5.
So incredible how smart they are!

 

[April Nicole]

Today at lunch, I didn't say a word, just hand signaled for her to come to sit and to give high 5.
So incredible how smart they are!

I was just thinking about that. They are very smart. All of the commands they are capable of learning amazes me. Logan now knows...sit ...down...look at me... easy... (we are working on)... leave it... and stay. And I taught him.. kisses.. someone mentioned that one in another post. Also he's completely house trained. Has not had an accident in at least 10 days. And he learned his name ...
All that in 3 weeks. Dogs are impressive.
We use hand signs also. I think they respond to them well.

Oh also he knows the words outside and inside

 

[Zeela]

I was just thinking about that. They are very smart. All of the commands they are capable of learning amazes me. Logan now knows...sit ...down...look at me... easy... (we are working on)... leave it... and stay. And I taught him.. kisses.. someone mentioned that one in another post. Also he's completely house trained. Has not had an accident in at least 10 days. And he learned his name ...
All that in 3 weeks. Dogs are impressive.
We use hand signs also. I think they respond to them well.

Oh also he knows the words outside and inside

Great! I know, they are very smart and easy to train. Zeela was the same and she still learns new things quickly. I am happy to hear things are going smooth with Logan. The best is that I taught Zeela when I walk her on a leash to go right, left, hold on, slow down, ignore, & head up! Impressive is an understatement! Amazing they are!!!

 

[Smokeycat]

For a lot of commands Kryten is much better with hand signals than he is with the verbal command.

 

[Jarena]

We pair all important commands with hand signals. It’s so helpful! Lettie hates it when we’re on the phone, so it’s nice to be able to distract her with commands without interrupting the conversation.

 

[Boxergirl]

For a lot of commands Kryten is much better with hand signals than he is with the verbal command.

This is actually very common. I was taught to teach the verbal cue first. Dogs pay so much attention to body language that if you teach the hand signal first, it may be difficult to really listen to the verbal cue later. In fact, I've seen a lot of owners in class that have been very surprised that their dogs didn't listen to the verbal cues unless they were paired with a hand signal.

 

[Nik]

Mine are much better with visual hand cues. They know the verbals but their response to visual cues is a lot sharper and more immediate. They are much better at learning visually.

 

[Sheila Braund]

Bella is better with the hand singles too.

 

[April Nicole]

This is actually very common. I was taught to teach the verbal cue first. Dogs pay so much attention to body language that if you teach the hand signal first, it may be difficult to really listen to the verbal cue later. In fact, I've seen a lot of owners in class that have been very surprised that their dogs didn't listen to the verbal cues unless they were paired with a hand signal.

We are doing the hand signals with the verbal command. Do you think we should just work on the verbal command first? I do notice he sometimes won't respond unless we do the hand gesture with the verbal, but he will usually respond to the hand gesture without the verbal nearly every time.

 

[Sheila Braund]

We are doing the hand signals with the verbal command. Do you think we should just work on the verbal command first? I do notice he sometimes won't respond unless we do the hand gesture with the verbal, but he will usually respond to the hand gesture without the verbal nearly every time.

This is what you should do.... Keep building your foundation like you are use both at the same time.... Then later just do the hand single....and after a week of that then do just the verbal....wait and if he doesn't do it do the hand single so his succeeds and treat with praise.... After a bit he will pick up on that verbal faster because he wants those treats and attention.

 

[Boxergirl]

Personally, if I wanted a quick and reliable response to a verbal cue I would work on that first. All of our training has been done by first capturing a behavior and marking it, then adding a name/cue verbally. After they are reliably responding to the verbal cue we add the hand signal.

There was a study done showing that when dogs were cued with conflicting verbal and hand signals - i.e. they were verbally asked to lie down but hand signalled to sit - they tended to choose the hand signal over the verbal cue. I'll have to look for it. It was interesting. It made me work harder on reliability with verbal cues.

 

[glen]

Agree boxergirl.
We do the verbal signals then when they got that spot on we introduce the hand signal to go with it, its worked for the boys, the hand signals work great when doing agility with gandy and cause im out of breath from the running i use the hand signsls to save my breath lol

 

[Sheila Braund]

I guess it's what works best for you.... We did the verbal with hand single as we would use our hand with treat to get our dogs in the sit. Once the dog got a good handle on that then we would do just hand singles.....then verbal. We did it the same way in our obedience classes.... I noticed the only thing that differed from the way I have always trained my dogs throughout the years was the hand singles.

At the end of the day it's best to do what works for you....

The only reason I started the classes was to learn the " correct" singles they use in shows.....and to train my husband as well. lol In the end I did get more from the classes then what I expected for beginners obedience classes. I can't wait until I'm healed enough to get to the 2nd classes and scent classes as well!

 

[Boxergirl]

Here's an interesting article from The Science Dog, Linda P. Case. I like her. She has some good books out there that I highly recommend.

https://thesciencedog.wordpress.com/tag/hand-signals/

 

[Ben Curtis]

My daughter taught Leo, that when she makes a gun with her hand, and says bang, he played dead. Unlike his other commands he did instantly. This command was a slow dramatic play dead, often times requiring multiple shots. Don't think he ever understood why all thought it was so funny.

 

[Zeela]

My daughter taught Leo, that when she makes a gun with her hand, and says bang, he played dead. Unlike his other commands he did instantly. This command was a slow dramatic play dead, often times requiring multiple shots. Don't think he ever understood why all thought it was so funny.

That's great! funny!!

 

[Zeela]

yesterday, Zeela & I were at the park, some nasty lady was around us and behind her back I hand signaled to Zeela....come & let's go! It worked, she looked at me with those big eyes & knew exactly what I meant!
Crazy Amazingly wonderful...blows my mind how she is so smart & loyal & just basically Incredible!

 

[Nik]

My daughter taught Leo, that when she makes a gun with her hand, and says bang, he played dead. Unlike his other commands he did instantly. This command was a slow dramatic play dead, often times requiring multiple shots. Don't think he ever understood why all thought it was so funny.

I have trained all of my dogs to do the "bang" command starting with Cerberus. The real trick was getting them to stay "dead" until released. It was an easy one to teach but everyone is always super impressed with that one. lol