Eye contact with your dog 

How many of us go searching for that particular dog, only to find a border collie or Heinz 57 sitting in the corner somewhere watching us, eye to eye, until we end up taking it home?

How many of us get that “I understand you” eye response from our dog enough to reward him/her when he/she does exactly what we want as we begin training?

What most dog owners do not understand is that this is the level of understanding we want to achieve from our pet; we need the dog to fully understand what we have said, enough for the command to be done immediately, without hesitation. In many of the training classes, 80% of the dogs and their trainers achieve this level. The other 20% go back to square one or go home.

Human beings and dogs have a lot in common when it comes to eye contact. If the relationship is good and a secure feeling is there, the eye contact is held steadily, and is easy to practice on a steady basis. If the relationship is on unsure ground and is not good, this eye contact is not practiced as easily. People and animals both communicate with their eyes along with their body language. The dominant one will hold the stare, and hopefully it will be the dog owner as compared to the dog! And eye contact is a much better process of training than being controlled by the leash. It is easier, faster and the most humane way for the dog to respond to you as the alpha leader.

First of all, train the dog to know what his/her name is, and to recognize that when you say that name you expect a response. When the dog does what you say, such as come to the name…praise the dog and put a treat between your eyes and the dog’s eyes. What you will be doing is teaching the dog eye contact with you, with an occasional treat. Do this three times minimum before letting the dog go. What you are doing is not only training the dog to develop eye contact with you, but sustaining its attention before letting the dog go. You need to keep control of the situation and the dog.

Not all eye contact is necessary. Dogs such as border collies or sheepdogs do not need to look at you to know their attention is needed. The attention needs to be focused on herding cattle or sheep or a similar task, and the eyes need to be somewhere besides on their owner. After they learn their name and eye contact, teach them to listen to cues without their name being involved. The total point is to teach the dog to know what you want. The eye contact is the beginning step to many other steps.

Once the dog learns to recognized eye contact and their owner’s face, they will learn the fine art of recognizing body language. And vice-versa. The leash will become unnecessary once you learn to control the dog with your eyes, body language, and movements of the body. Once the dog learns to communicate with their owners using the eye contact, they will learn to “check in” all the time to understand what is wanted from them.  Just watch any border collie to see this constant glancing in action.