Are you struggling to teach your Hovawart to sit? The talent of sitting up is quickly taught to little dogs, but larger doggies are a different story. It is tricky for them to keep their balance.
Teach Your Hovawart to Sit: Anticipation
Sitting is one of the fundamental skills that should be taught to your Hovawart and lays the groundwork for a lot of other skills. To train a Hovawart to sit up, prep some treats as a reward, and set the Hovawart on her butt in the corner, so that she won’t be able to fall either backward or sideways and has very little or no room to lose balance.
Teach Your Hovawart to Sit: Acquaint Her With The Command
Stop her from tilting to the front by securing your hand beneath her chin and using the other hand dangle her snack above your Hovawart’s face. Keep repeating deliberately and distinctly, “sit up.” Do not make her sit up too long at one time, however repeat the lesson often and reward her frequently with loads of recognition and snacks.
Teach Your Hovawart to Sit: Help Her Maintain Balance
Throughout the first lesson she will need considerable support from you to stop her from falling forward, but as she gets more control of the muscles and figures out what you want, she will depend less and less on your hand to hold her in position. Gradually, you can give your Hovawart less support until you’ll basically have to leave one hand in position two or three inches from her chin or neck, to be in position to prevent her falling forward; eventually you can withdraw your hand and merely dangle the reward just over the height of her head.
Teach Your Hovawart To Sit: Remove the Assistance Slowly And Gradually
With regular practice she will sit up well after you command her. Afterward she should be set against your wall, so as to give her support for her back only. Only after she has mastered this and can maintain her posture effortlessly, practice with her against chair legs, pillows or other items that offer her less and less support. At some point she will get the hang of how to sustain her equilibrium and sit up without anything to lean on.
Teach Your Hovawart to Sit: Putting It All Together
During all these lessons the command "sit up" will have been instilled upon her subconscious by regular repetition. Lastly comes the final lesson to teach your Hovawart to sit up as soon as she hears the words. Most likely, if she has been diligently instructed, you will merely have to summon her out into the room, show to her a treat, hold it up a suitable distance from the floor, say "sit" and she'll do so. Then just give her the treat while still in place.
The only necessity for excellence is to rehearse with her several times daily until she will sit when told and without being shown a reward; give her the rewards only after she has complied with the direction.
Teach Your Hovawart Other Tricks
You have now the technique for teaching your Hovawart many other skills. She now can be taught to beg by moving your hand up and down in front of her paws, which she'll move in conjunction with yours. She also can be taught to salute by moving one paw to the side of her head, or to hold a toy in her mouth, or to wear a cap on her head or wear other articles of clothing.
In instructing a Hovawart to submit to being dressed up, don't try to make her wear too many items simultaneously. Try at first with just a hat. Once she becomes adjusted to that you can put on a coat and gradually over time introduce her to the other clothes.
Take pleasure in "teaching your Hovawart the sit up trick" and most importantly have fun while you're doing it!
Don't forget to check out these other articles about Hovawarts
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