LOOK AT ME

"Until one has loved an animal a part of one's soul remains unawakened."  Anotole France

I often encounter people poking their dogs in the neck and  saying "Look at Me, Look at Me" while they point at their eyes. Need less to say this occurs when the dog is being less than attentive.


My personal feeling is that this "Look at Me" process is redundant, superfluous, and entirely unnecessary, if you had simply used the proper procedure to teach the dog his name. What is it you want the dog to do when you command him to Look at Me? Presumably you want him to look toward you and since you are pointing at your face I have to assume you want him to look there.


Excuse me, but isn't that precisely what we teach the dog to do when we are teaching him his name? 

Remember the part where we hold a treat about a foot in front of our face and say a single word. The Dog's name. If he looks toward us, that is a positive reaction and we reciprocate with a like positive reaction. We reach down and open our hand and offer a reward which at this stage is usually a small food treat about the size of the end of our little finger. We repeat this simple task four or five times and take a break and then repeat the training process for an additional four or five times. We do this in repetitions of five times every day. The behaviorists tell us to do this daily for six weeks so we "imprint" the name. It also helps if you keep a few treats handy and do a few "reps" throughout the day.


I have done and taught this for a very long time and the result is that when you speak the dog's name he looks directly at you for direction. Now isn't the same result the "Look at Me" folks are trying to achieve? Of course it is, so why bother to teach two systems. Seems to me, we make our dog's learning process confusing enough for him without bothering to duplicate an exercise by simply changing the ground rules.


I'm reminded of a story I read a while back about a very accomplished Scottish trainer who was a master at everything from detection dogs to herding dogs and he didn't teach the Stay. His contention was that when he said Sit, he meant Sit and there was no reason for an addition command. The dog should sit until he was directed to go on to something else, therefore the Stay command was unnecessary. He felt the same about Stay when in a Down. When you think about it, it makes good sense. I tried it but after all these years I seem to be programmed to use the Stay command but I do accept the wisdom of his concept.


So with the same thought why not give thought to doing a good job teaching the dog his name and you won't have to do the "Look at Me" thing.