Training Stay with Step Over (Patreon)

Throughout your service dog's career they're going to be stepped around and over quite a bit. It's important to prepare them for that eventuality.

I had a bit of down-time in my recent Family Dog 2 class between exercises, so I decided to introduce the step-over stay to Denver. This is his first time doing a stay where I stepped completely over him.

To introduce this new portion of the stay, I can use patterns to introduce the concept incrementally. I start with doing my walk behind, which is something he's already comfortable with. I purposefully go back and forth, forming a pattern of my behavior so that when I begin stepping over him, it's within the context of this back and forth pattern, so he can expect me to appear at his side again.

Alternatively, you could make full circles in one direction, adding the step over, and then another set where you go in the other direction.

Notes: It's probably a better training setup to introduce this at home rather than in a classroom with other dogs ;)