How to Teach Watch Me

Having a dog that will make eye contact with you, and keep focus with you is a very important step in effective leadership and breaking your dog’s focus from distractions.

You may be surprised at just how often a skill like this is going to come in handy throughout your dog’s adult life! So start teaching it to your puppy! It’s easy, it’s no conflict, and as a puppy it’s an easy way to earn a treat and to start learning to learn!

For Puppies - -make it fun!

For your older dogs where we already have some behavioral issues to resolve — make it a little more mtter of fact — though of course you can always Praise and reward after success!

I usually start teaching this skill by sitting on the floor - eye to eye with the dog.

Show puppy a treat by holding it in front of their nose, and then raising the treat to the temple of your eye & say Watch Me.  Mark it “Good”, Then give your dog a treat from the other hand.   Do several repetitions in succession, several times throughout the day.

Phase two becomes — you hold the treat a couple of inches off to the side of your face. Say Watch me and wait. It may take a few minutes. Your dog may be focused on the treat — but I promise at some point he’s going to flick his eyes toward your face as if to say, “hey mom, give me that treat!”. Mark “Good” the second your dog' flicks his eyes to yours. Help him understand it’s the eye movement we’re rewarding.

Switch hands / Which side the treat is on

Phase three: have treats in both hands — and repeat the Watch Me and wait for eye contact.

Keep advancing by moving the food treats further from your face, adding motion to the treats, etc — waiting patiently each time for your dog to see your face.

Once you have the basics — practice several random times throughout the day, before offering a treat or dinner, as an advancement to waiting at the door / crate — and be sure to practice outside too.

Repeat often until the Watch Me cue creates immediate eye contact with you.     You’ll advance by practicing in new locations with distractions.

You will use this command to interrupt your dog’s attention on other things, and then communicate other actions to them. We use it a lot with Leash Reactive dogs, or dogs that fixate their attention on distractions.