Happy Howlidays

From everyone at the Ottawa Canine School,

We wish you and yours a very happy holidays! May you enjoy some extra cuddle time with your animals, extra long walks with your canine friend and a few lazy mornings just taking in the beauty of the simple things.

We hope to see you in the new year!

 

 

About The Author

Chantal Mills, BEd., CSAT, CPDT-KA

Owner and Lead Trainer of Ottawa Canine School. Chantal has a passion for teaching!

Chantal is a Certified Separation Anxiety Trainer (CSAT), an accredited dog trainer (Certified Professional Dog Trainer – Knowledge Assessed), a member of the American Association of Pet Dog Trainers (APDT), a member of the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants (IAABC) and a member of the Pet Professional Guild (PPG – the Association for Force-Free Pet Professionals). She regularly attends conferences, workshops, seminars and webinars to keep up to date with the latest in the industry.

Keep Reading

A dog’s state of mind

A dog’s state of mind

Dogs are constantly forming emotional associations that inform their decisions. Is it safe, unsafe, dangerous, good, bad or neutral ?  This associative learning is also called classical conditioning or Pavlovian conditioning, named after Ivan Pavlov, the Russian scientist who accidentally discovered that dogs learn through association.

All animals learn through classical conditioning, all the time. Some associations can be quite helpful or simply benign. For example, if a dog enters the Ottawa Canine School for the first time and I offer him a fun toy to play with, the dog will likely associate the training school as a safe, good and fun place.

read more

Board & Train

If you google "Board & Train", you'll find everything from compelling reasons why it's a brilliant idea to strong deterrents aimed at showing why it's a waste of your hard earned money. When you...

read more
TRAUMA & PTSD

TRAUMA & PTSD

I'm sorting through binders and binders of notes taken at various conferences I attended in the last decade. Some of the information is now dated and some is still quite relevant. I stumble upon...

read more