Why Go To Puppy Class?

Classes for young puppies up to about 4 months old are often called Puppy Pre-School, I call mine Kindy Puppy Class.  So why is Puppy Class so important?

Puppies have a window of opportunity for socialisation that closes at around 4 months old (most agree it’s a little sooner in fact).  This means that what puppies are exposed to and experience during this time becomes their normal.  Getting them used to lots of novel experiences during this time makes a huge difference to how they develop and cope throughout their lives.  After this time new things they encounter may not be well accepted and may in fact be scary for them.  It’s a good survival trait in the wild to be wary of new things because they may harm you, but when our pet dogs are scared of people wearing hats, small children, skateboards or other dogs it can seriously impact their quality of life as well as that of the owners.

Of course there are puppies who never attend puppy class and turn out just fine, others who do attend puppy class and have issues, but stack the odds in your favour and do your best to make sure you make use of that tiny window of opportunity to help your puppy grow up to be a happy, confident and well adjusted dog.

Unfortunately many puppies miss out on the opportunity for safe, controlled exposure to new things for many reasons, but a small investment in time and effort now pays back many times over throughout your dog’s life.  It’s not enough that you have another dog at home, that’s not socialisation.  It’s not enough that you’ve had dogs all your life, your puppy is the one who needs exposure to new things, not you.  It’s not enough that “he’s doing fine right now I won’t worry” because that may well change.  It’s not enough that you’ll get on to it when you have the time, or the weather is better or the kids’ sport has finished because that will be too late.  It’s not enough that your last dog didn’t do puppy school and was perfect, this is a different dog.  It’s not enough that you’ll be careful nothing scary happens to your pup, scary stuff doesn’t need to happen for dogs to be scared, lack of exposure to new things can cause dogs to be scared.

It doesn’t mean training and behaviour modification can’t be done at any age; it can, but I can guarantee it is so much easier to prevent problems in the first place or at least get on top of them immediately. 

Puppy classes help your pup to be exposed to and meet other puppies of a similar age and people in a carefully controlled and safe way to encourage them to be calm and confident.  Classes will give you the opportunity to introduce your pup to new experiences such as walking on different surfaces and objects, introducing training exercises in a way that encourages pups to succeed and have fun at the same time.  Being away from home in itself, exposes them to new sights, sounds and smells.  It gives you the chance to ask questions and be able to determine if your pup’s behaviour is within the normal range or if it needs extra attention now to prevent escalation.

Those first few weeks of your puppy’s life can never be repeated.  Don’t be too busy to invest in the most important time in their life.