Foundation Skills 1-on-1 Private Training

Achieve your dog training goals and dreams with highly personalized, 1-on-1 lessons tailored specifically for you and your dog’s unique needs, delivered by our certified professional dog trainers.

dog trainer coaching dog and client

Your dog, your goals, your pace. Our undivided attention.

Congrats! You have a new dog in your life. What kind of hopes and dreams do you have?

Imagine your dog confidently greeting friends and neighbors with a wagging tail, calmly walking by your side on leash, and quickly recalling back to you while at the dog park. You’ll feel a surge of pride as you confidently take your dog anywhere, knowing they’ll be a welcomed guest.

Everyone remarks how sweet and well-trained they are. Friends offer to dog sit for you, they’re always welcome to come over, you can bring them to work with you, and they are your sidekick at the farmer’s market, outdoor patios, and hanging at the local park.

But this isn’t possible for a lot of dogs. Why? Dogs that don’t get the second invite over… jump all over people, steal food from the counter, bark incessantly, pull on leash like a bungee cord, bolt through open doors, and take off chasing other dogs and squirrels at the park with no recall.

Want to have a dog that’s welcome everywhere? Ensure they know their Foundation Skills.

When your time is more limited than your budget, choose Foundation Skills 1-on-1 lessons so that we can tailor every session specifically to you and your dog’s unique needs.

The Program

Private In-Home Lessons covering Foundation Skills such as:

  • Focus/Attention and Name Response
  • Walk With Me
  • Lay Down
  • Hand Targeting (Touch)
  • Go to Bed
  • Playing Tug (And Drop)
  • Sit-Stay, Down-Stay
  • Doggie Zen (aka Leave It)
  • Paw Object
  • Recall Exercises
  • Engage-Disengage
  • Behaviour Generalization

Also, if you have a puppy under 5 months age, we can help you with matters normally covered in Puppy Socialization classes such as:

  • House Training
  • Nipping/Biting
  • Preventing Resource Guarding
  • Handling/Grooming/Restraint Exercises
German Shepherd Dog
“When we adopted our dog, Corky, she didn’t even know her name and didn’t know any commands.

By the end of Foundation Skills, she knows a ton! How to sit, lay down, and even go to bed!

Most of all, you gave us the skills and knowledge to train Corky on an ongoing basis. Corky had a blast!”
 

– Corky and Lauren R.

Our Service Area

Lessons Via Zoom: Anywhere!

In-person lessons are available as follows:

Map of Private Lesson In-Home Service Areas

Downtown West: Bordered by Dupont to the North, Spadina to the East, Parkside Dr to the West, Lakeshore to the South

Etobicoke/Swansea: Bordered by Bloor to the North, High Park to the East, Kipling to the West, Lakeshore to the South

Midtown: Bordered by Lawrence to the North, Mt Pleasant to the East, Roxborough St to the South, Avenue to the West.

East End: Bordered by O’Connor/St Clair to the North, Woodbine to the East, Broadview Avenue to the West, to Dundas East at the South.

Markham: Around 16th and Woodbine Ave.

In-school lessons are available out of all of our 5 locations (Pinmarked on the above map). We are happy to work with you at our facilities if you are outside of our service area.

Add-On: Intensive Coaching

For behavioral breakthroughs with leash walking, recall, impulse control, and more…

(Limited availability)

To achieve breakthrough improvements, each of our instructors accepts a limited number of clients for Intensive Coaching.

By booking multiple weekly lessons for a period of four weeks:

  • We directly work hands-on with your dog, so they benefit from our expert timing and training skills
  • You can watch and observe as we train, to learn how we respond to your dog’s behaviour in a variety of settings
  • We go various locations like your home, your neighbourhood, and your dog parks; in the environments that are part of you and your dog’s life
  • We provide intensive coaching to help you become really skilled at training and communicating with your dog

Examples where Intensive Coaching could help: 

  • To help with leash reactivity to other dogs or people in your neighbourhood
  • To work on engagement and recall at the dog park
  • To help fast-track your new puppy’s leash walking skills and behaviour in public
  • To help with resource guarding issues
  • To help with body-handling issues (co-operative care)

Our clients who sign up for Intensive Coaching see rates of improvement that wouldn’t be possible if they did it alone, or only saw us once every couple of weeks!

Ask your instructor about adding on Intensive Coaching!

 

What’s It Cost?

(June 1, 2024)

Please note, availability of senior vs. master level instructor varies by location and if you have a specific request, we may need you to travel to a specific location for your lesson.

For details regarding class/training policies, please see our Policy page:

Okay, I’m Ready to Book!