What Is Life Skills Foundation?
Life Skills Foundation is the skills and behaviours that you need to teach your dogs to help them develop into well mannered, happy, safe and friendly dogs, dogs that you can take proudly anywhere! The classes cover a multitude of both exciting and life exercises. They are skills such as:
- a really reliable recall
- a solid stay
- greeting people and dogs politely
- food manners and leaving food (human!)
- comfortable being handled and groomed
- walking on a loose lead
- crate and boundary games
- relationship building
- having a confident dog
- and so much more!
This is just a small example of the skills covered but they are all taught using positive, reward-based training methods. The main underlying theme of all of the classes, regardless of the level, is building a happy, positive relationship between you and your dog. We also encourage you to ask questions.
To ensure success we always suggest that you work with your dog in small steps, to give them the best possible chance of getting the behaviour right, and therefore gaining a reward. If we set them too difficult a challenge, and they fail, and continue to fail, they will become de-motivated and lose all interest in us and our attempts to work with them. Because of this, we always suggest that you set yourself and your dog small and achievable goals.
You will work in a small class with one of our experienced trainers who can give you the best advice specific to your goals. This is a great opportunity for you to socialize with other like-minded dog-owners who want to get the most out of their relationships with their dogs. And of course it’s a super time for your dog to work around other dogs in a controlled environment. Many classes at other clubs are much larger than this but we feel this number will allow you maximum time for progress.
Life Skills Foundation Classes
We run weekly classes aimed at different levels and abilities of dogs. We would begin at starter level and you can progress right through to our genius level.
In order to join in with our Life Skills Foundation training you will need to purchase our Introductory Welcome Package as an initial starting point.
Your Introductory Welcome Programme rolls straight into our weekly classes and it is super easy and planned in for you to do this. All you need to do is to setup a standing order during your first few weeks of the introduction. The standing order needs to be payable on the first of each month. It’s as simple as that!
Check out the exercises and super fun games we’ve got planned for you, these are specifically chosen for you and your dog’s needs and pitched at your level.
Some of the other benefits of the Welcome Package include:
- You will progress along with other students in the class;
- You will receive regular homework;
- Access to the Facebook Devon Dogs Student Room where you can post progress videos and ask questions in between classes;
- Periodic planning and goal setting;
- Discounts on camps;
- Discounts on certain workshops;
- Discounts on certain products;
- 10% off of your stay at Bowerland Holiday Cottages;
- A fantastic annual gift
Cost – all this for a super duper £55 per month
Max was a 7 month old Border Collie when I got him, he had been in 3 homes and each one could not cope with his boisterous behaviour, this included jumping up, counter surfing, barking, and being unable to switch off. I was new to Devon Dogs and so decided to try their Life Skills classes to get a feel for what they do: I was also thinking it would help Max. The first training session came along and Max was a nightmare: he was lunging at the other dogs, barking all the time, pulling me over, and generally making a nuisance of himself. We learnt about choice games and using the crate as a boundary, homework was given, and we practiced every day at least twice. I could begin to see glimmers of hope, Max was showing that he could concentrate, make the correct choices and he loved getting his tennis ball as a reward. Over the weeks I found his 'off switch' (massage) and used this during the lesions to help keep him calm. A year on, Max is a different dog: he is responsive, can listen, and he loves any kind of training. We did two lots of Life Skills and are now starting to compete in Flyball. I can't thanks Devon Dogs enough for these lessons: the skills they teach really are 'Life Skills' and make having a dog such a pleasure. Thanks to you all.
Jo Wallace