5 Ways To Do Dog Potty Training

Communication is the essential part in our life, including communicating with your pets. It is so great if they can talk what they want to, it would take the guess work out of establishing routines.

In order to train your puppy to ask when he wants to go out, we need to understand his routine and action first. In this article, we will go through some information as below:

Signs Your Puppy Wants to Go Out

Use Crate Training as an Aid to Potty Training

Classical Conditioning

Classical Conditioning and Dog Potty Training

Ring a Bell, Go Outside

Let’s have a look on those details

Signs Your Puppy Wants to Go Out

When you have a new dog, it is a good idea to potty train your puppy. It is important to look at his routine and give the suitable guide to potty train your pet.

Potty training should begin with developing a schedule that both you and your dog can follow. You may also wish to use a repeatable phrase, such as “bathroom” or “potty,” each time you take your puppy to the elimination area so that they learn to associate that word with the action. Here are some do’s and don’ts of potty training a dog.

Before you start potty training a puppy, know that he is ready to give you the sign that he wants to go out. Keep an eyes on them as the following signs:

• Sniffing and circling the place
• Whining 
• Pacing or fidgeting

Developing the routine of your dog’s potty break is the certainty

If your puppy is still soiling inside, the first thing is that house trained steps should be taken. Helping them for the feeding schedule and going out. This prevents them from relieving themself in your house. Reward them for going outside with affirmations and treats immediately when they’re finished to condition the act. 

Similar tactics are used to train them to tell you they need to go out.

Use Crate Training as an Aid to Potty Training

It is a very effective tool to help not only with potty training your puppy, but also with creating a safe place for his to call home. Dogs are naturally den animals, so their instincts will tell them to find a quiet place to eat and rest at the end of the day.

Dogs do not like to eliminate where they sleep or eat, so training your puppy to be comfortable in a crate is a great way to prevent them from having accidents in the house. The crate should not be used as punishment, but it should be used whenever your puppy cannot be directly supervised and for naptime and bedtime.

Choosing the correct crate size is extremely important, especially for large breed dogs that grow rapidly during puppyhood. Keep in mind that your puppy should only have enough room to stand up, turn around, and lie down comfortably.

Any more room will give your dog room to rest in one corner and pee or poop in the other. Many crates come with a divider that can be moved as your puppy grows.

Classical Conditioning

Training your puppy comes down to classical conditioning. If Ivan Pavlov could teach a dog to salivate on command, surely you can use the same techniques to teach them to ask to go out. 

Classical conditioning is fairly simple.

The original experiment involved ringing a bell when the puppies were fed. After enough time repeating this act, simply ringing the bell caused the puppies to salivate. They were ready to eat. This type of basic learning is called “reflexive”.

Classical Conditioning and Dog Potty Training

House training your puppy involves a lots conditionings. For instance, you may potty train a puppy a half-hour after each meal. Your dog may even be conditioned to need to potty when your alarm goes off in the morning.

Training your dog to ask to go out also involves adding an extra stimulus to their house training routine. The most common technique trains your dog to ring a bell when they need to go out.

Ring a Bell, Go Outside

It is better when you training your dog to ring a bell if they want to go outside rather than bark or stand in front of the door. This technique trains your puppy to pair ringing a bell with their need to relieve themselves.

Step 1. You need to train your dog to ring the bell

1. Hold the bell close to their nose. When they touch the bell, give them a reward. The reward depends on your dog, but a treat usually works fine. 
2. Repeat until your puppy doesn’t hesitate to touch their nose to the bell. 
3. Start adding a cue or command word like “touch” to their act of touching the bell.
4. Hold the bell far enough away from them so that they must take a few steps to touch their nose to it. This adds a physical aspect to the task.

Step 2. This step trains them to ring the bell on the door on command

1. Choose the door in your house that you will typically take your pupy out of and hang the bell on the door. 
2. Continue the training from step 1 with the bell on the door, using the command word. 
3. Don’t forget about rewards and praise when your dog touches the bell! 
4. Repeat this step until your dog touches the bell on cue. 

There are products you can buy that allow your puppy to simply touch a button with their paw to ring a bell. Whatever you think is best for you and your pet will work fine.

Step 3. At this point, your dog will be trained to touch the bell on cue. This step teaches your dog to touch the bell at a specific time

1. Approach the door and cue your dog to touch the bell with your command word. 
2. When they do, react with excitement, open the door, and take them outside. 
3. With enough repetition, your dog will learn that you will open the door and take them out whenever they ring the bell. 

Sometimes, your puppy may ring the bell just to go outside and play. You’ll have to reinforce to them that the bell is for potty time. When they ring the bell, put on their leash and take them to the part of the yard where they typically relieve themselves for a few minutes. If they go potty, affirm and reward. If they do not, go back inside.

With enough repetition, your dog will learn that ringing the bell means going out to potty. This requires a lot of repetition, patience, and participation from everyone in your household day by day.

To sum up, you should have a look at your dog’s routine, then house training them use the bell whenever they want to go out to potty by making it become their routine.