Dog clicker training is one of the more recent methods in dog training. It’s based on research done in behavioral psychology and the method is referred to by psychologists as operant conditioning. But you don’t need to know technical terminology in order to use it to great benefit.

The method was first developed with marine mammals like dolphins. With the dolphins, a whistle was used rather than a clicker. You can visualise how difficult it is to train a dolphin compared to a dog. This particular method uses the idea of positive reinforcement. It was very difficult to give a fish to a dolphin at the moment the dolphin enacted the behaviour you wanted. However, you could blow a whistle immediately. Then you could follow that with a tasty treat soon afterwards.

In order to reward a desired action, you need to reinforce it at the moment it occurs or very soon afterwards or the animal will not relate the reward with the action. The whole reward process is made so much easier and clearer by using a sound from a whistle or clicker to mark the action.

The first step is to positively associate the clicker sound with getting a tasty treat. By clicking and following the click with a treat many times, the sound and the reward become associated. Once this association is made, the clicker sound itself becomes a reward in itself since it's so closely related to treats in the dog's perception. This process is called charging the clicker by trainers.

When the clicker has been charged, you use the clicker when the dog does a desired behavior and you always follow the action with a treat. In true clicker training, you wait for your dog to offer the behavior naturally and click and treat. In order to do this complex behaviors need to be broken down into smaller chunks. A tool which assists in this process is the target stick.

One of the first exercises in clicker training is to get your dog to touch his nose to the target stick. Once your dog completes this task, the stick can be used to direct your dog to a particular place. This is so helpful when training your dog in other actions.

Getting your dog to touch the target stick is easy. If you position it in front of his face, he will probably touch it. Then you click and treat. Be sure to allow your dog to touch the stick: don’t touch it to his nose! Repeat this for a couple of minutes. Then take a rest.

It can take some time when a dog is new to clicker training, especially if he is an older dog. So you need to be patient. You may need to repeat the target stick session a couple of times before he gets the connection. But once he’s got it, the learning will stay.

Another tool which is very useful in clicker training is a mouse pad or something similar that you train your dog to step on with one of his front feet. You can get your dog to do this easily by just putting it down on the ground near him and waiting for him to step on it. Immediately, click and reward. As before, repeat this until your dog gets it. As with the target stick, this tool can then be used to direct your dog to a particular place in further training.

In clicker training, a behavior is trained first as with the target stick and mouse pad and only then is a cue added. A cue means that you use a word or command prior to the behavior - for example, "fetch" or "sit". You do this by saying the command just as you think the dog is about to do the behavior. As always you click and reward the action. Then, by repeating this, the word becomes associated with the treat, just like the clicker sound is. Please note that when you start training with the cue, you don't reward the behavior alone any more - it has to be preceded by the cue. If the dog just offers the behavior, there is no click or reward.

I hope this has given you some idea of how the clicker is used as an effective tool in dog training. You will want to read much more about it if you are interested in trying clicker training. What I particularly like about it is that it’s very systematic and all that's needed is patience and consistency. Read more about clicker training for dogs, a review of the best clicker training guide, and also reviews of other dog training books.