Teaching your dog to lie down is a useful behaviour to help encourage them to settle, stay in one place for a while or do some doggie push-ups (down, stand, sit). 

Start in a familiar, low-distraction environment, on non-slip flooring, such as a mat. Prep 10 small (pea-sized or smaller depending on the size of your animal), squishy treats.

• Use your pet’s ‘start training’ cue (see here: Start and End Cue)
• If they’re ready, take one treat and place it at a short distance in front of your pet’s nose
• Slowly move your hand upwards and behind your pet’s head - this is called ‘luring’
• As soon as their bottom touches the floor, slowly move your hand down, between their front legs
• If your dog follows your hand, slightly moving their head, paws, or elbows, use your marker and reinforce
• Repeat for a couple more times; each time, reward them for moving their elbows closer to the ground while their rear continues to stay on the ground (this is called shaping: building small steps to the final behaviour)
• Once your hand and dog’s body have almost reached the floor, slowly move your hand towards you and parallel to the floor until the dog has both elbows on the floor
• Begin to fade your lure by doing the same hand action without the treat in your hand 
• Slowly morph your hand action into your hand signal (i.e. flat hand, with palm facing down, moving towards the ground)
• Finish your training session after ten treats; use your ‘finished cue’

• When your pet responds reliably to the hand signal (4 out of 5 times), say the word you want to use just before you use the hand signal
• If you want to only use the word, ensure you fade out the hand movement by just saying the word and waiting for them to do the behaviour

Begin training under different distractions, distances, and at different durations. See [the three d’s)

• Keep training sessions short, max two minutes at a time when beginning a new behaviour
• Don’t worry if you don’t get all the way - small shorter sessions work faster than big long ones
• If your dog’s bum keeps popping up, you can lure them under your leg to help get the bent elbows first
• Be quiet at first - say the cue and wait a few seconds for them to do the behaviour 
• If your dog keeps popping up after one second, reward them multiple times on the floor, between their wrists
• Be clear: do you say down to tell them to get off the furniture or stop jumping? Do you tell them ‘drop’ to drop items out of their mouth? Check your word usage and be clear before you choose your cue - we’re confusing enough!