Place

I find this cue to be extremely helpful, and even more so when it becomes something a dog offers instead of say, jumping up on the kitchen counter.

How to Teach

Your place can be a dog bed, mat or other station.  To develop willingness to move away from you, we start by isolating the act of your dog putting their feet on the place.  They need to develop an understanding that it is about  their feet and the place, not your position.

• With your dog beside you
• Stand still with the place in front of both of you
• With an empty hand, gesture toward the place and cue your dog to go on the place
• Say your marker word as soon as they steps on the place
• Toss your reward on the place to leverage the reward placement to further your goal.  

Choosing to Remain
Now we are going to introduce duration.  We are going to do this by rewarding any attempt your dog makes to remain on the place.

• Cue your dog to go to the place, mark and reward.
• If they are still on the place after eating the treat, calmly toss another treat
• If you pause and they are still on the place, toss another treat
• After a few treat tosses, release your dog or call them off the place for a break then cue them to return to the place.

Choosing to Remain + Removal of Attention
Next we are going to make sure that your dog can remain on their place even when you aren't standing close by looking at them. 

• Cue your dog to go to the place, mark and reward.
• Pause

• If they are still on the place calmly toss another treat
• Turn your back to your dog, then turn back to face them
• If they are still on the place, toss another treat
• After a few treat tosses, release your dog off the place 

You can practice with a variety of things that occupy your attention or change your shape i.e.

• Crouching down as if to tie your shoe
• Sitting in a chair
• Looking at your phone
• Tidying things on your counter
  

Preparing for Real Life
Once your dog understands the place cue, you can start to tailor the distractions to the situations that you want to use it in.  This may be things like cooking in the kitchen, loading the dishwasher, greeting guests at the front door, etc.  

For the kitchen, I recommend starting with tidying up, so that you can frequently reward your dog for choosing to remain on their place, then as they get more comfortable with those distractions, gradually decrease the frequency of the treats.  At that point, it's usually easier to practice while you are cooking when you may not be able to reward as frequently.

When it comes to guests at the door, I highly recommend working on as many distractions as you can before you add in a person outside the door.  Things such as opening the door, and knocking noises.  Then when you are ready to add a person, ideally start with someone that has already been in the house.  Have them go out while your dog watches, then have your dog go to their place while you let the person in.  Splitting things into smaller, easier steps makes it more likely that your dog can focus on learning because they don't get too excited, and that they can succeed at the challenge.

What if it's not working?
It's not unusual to run into snags while teaching this skill.  Sometimes I need to suggest little tweaks to my clients to help make it clearer to their dog what it is that we want.  For example, sometimes using a raised bed, or adding a "bumper" to a mat to give more clarity about what constitutes on the place helps a dog that is having difficulty consistently getting all of their feet on the place.  So if you find you have run into a snag, reaching out for help from a professional can be a great way to get unstuck.