Oscar Board and Train day 6

My sweet friend, Oscar, goes home tomorrow. He has great progress. He still needs his owners to practice with him and to have high expectations of his behavior. He will backslide if people allow him to get away with not following direction. Deciding that he does not know his commands or for some reason can’t do it will only teach him how much he can get away with. But he enjoys work and he responds well to fair discipline when he gets a little silly. He will likely enjoy it more at home when he is working for the praise of his people. He is very bonded to his people and so their praise will be worth more than anyone else’s.
Oscar has been a very polite and pleasant house guest. He has tolerated the children and even enjoyed their company but he has rules for interacting with them and it is important to understand what he will tolerate and what he won’t in order to keep everyone safe and having a good time. He does not want to hurt anyone and he is by no means a biter. But he has limits to how much handling he can tolerate from children. He tries very hard to give many clear indicators that he is getting uncomfortable and so that should tell us that he does not want to bite. The hard part is helping small children understand his language. We need to help Oscar by trying our hardest to teach his kids how he likes to be touched and we need to be firm with Oscar when he makes a mistake. He is one smart cookie and so I am looking forward to supporting his owners as they introduce more children to his life.
I will miss Oscar. He has been a good buddy this week and a fun dog to train. Such a gentleman!