Maribeth Hook

Anyone who takes one of Maribeth Hook's training classes will leave with one important message: Owning a dog should be fun.

"One of the things that I stress is that owners need to be patient," Hook says. "For dogs, English is not their first language. They have to learn to communicate with us with a completely new language. They watch our gestures, and that allows them to learn and understand us."

Hook grew interested in dog training when her own dog proved to be difficult to train.

She sought advice from a University of Pennsylvania expert and learned several new methods. She had such good results with her dog that she returned to Pittsburgh and started work at the WPHS in 1998. She's been teaching ever since.

Besides training her own dogs, her other education has come from teaching classes - like Teen Intervention, I'm a Big Pup Now and Adult Basic I - and from attending seminars. Hook says her favorite part of the job is viewing the interaction between the owners and the dogs.

"I like watching the dogs learn, and then watching the light bulbs go off in the dogs' heads and the owners' heads," she says.

In the classroom, Hook defines herself as a positive reinforcement trainer and is mostly a clicker trainer. She uses minor negatives, like the turn your back method.

She begins each class by urging owners to reconnect with their dogs with a target exercise or other focus exercise. Then, adult dogs go directly into the lesson. For her puppy classes, she might create a little contest among the dogs.

After about ten minutes, she lets everyone take a break so the dogs can relax. She then goes into a different lesson, but she only teaches a maximum of three new principles per class.

After about ten minutes, she lets everyone take a break so the dogs can relax. She then goes into a different lesson, but she only teaches a maximum of three new principles per class.

To finish, she might add more distractions - other than the distracting other dogs - like an umbrella or bouncing ball that dogs will encounter in everyday life.

"The owner has to learn how to keep the dog comfortable in a new environment, so this is really about training the owners," she says.
She says the majority of WPHS owners are interested in making life with their pet more manageable. However, they often get caught up in their dogs' successes and want to learn more. About 30 percent go on to learn more things, she says.

Still, Hook says that owners often take training too seriously, which sometimes creates a problem.

"Some owners want it to happen really fast, and they don't enjoy the process," she says. "That's the hard part. They want everything, and they can't enjoy the process of teaching their dogs."

Hook says that problem can be solved by viewing one's dog as a teammate.

"You don't have all the responsibility on your shoulders," she says. "Your dog has his own responsibilities, like not barking in his crate. Our guiding helps them get through that. But we don't have to take on everything. Our dogs can share some of that responsibility."