how do puppies adapt to multi-lingual families

mvl

as in the title: our puppy is 12 weeks old. she's with us for few weeks now - we as a family didn't have a dog before.

we speak few languages in the house/noticed with her too.
this got me to wonder (maybe a silly question): as she is like a new baby in the house // would it confuse her if we're talking to her in all spoken languages ? does anyone have ideas how to handle this (re. when training)

thanks.

yellowlabrador

agree to some key words when you want her to respond to a wish. she'll soon adapt. make sure you train her

mazwell

We speak English and Irish to our dog she understands commands in both

JustAThought

Be consistent with the commands you use to train and teach your dog. Dogs are smart *well - many are!) If you use two commands at the same time and reward both for the same thing no doubt they will grow up bilingual too! Just think of situations where you know the dog will be out with other dogs and need to know and understand tge same basic everyday commands - down,sit,stay, come, give. You dont want it not to have that vocubalary in english if someone orders it to get off their picnic/child/wife/ball or if there is an emergency and people will be shouting at it for you if they are minding it for you. What kind if dog is it? How lovely to have a new puppy : )

Zapperzy

My old dog (and my current two cats to a certain extent) was trained to hand signals, used to have verbal commands but I think it was mostly the hand signals and body language he responded to. Things like a closed fist held out for sit, hand flat and wave downwards for lie down, wave up for stand up, twirl my outstretched finger to get him to roll over or spin.

Things like recall can ye agree to call his name or a whistle?

Mrcaramelchoc

I've no idea op but its a fantastic question.

Cows Go µ

As above, my dogs generally respond to hand signals and body language much more than verbal commands (though I'm working on verbal commands as we do agility so they can't always see me). The only problem with multiple languages is having more than 1 word for the same command. They will probably work it out eventually but they would learn words much faster if you consistently use the same word every time.

ganmo

Be aware of words that start or end with similar sounding syllables.
In Irish and English sit and suí are close enough to be used together again quiet and ciunis with the sharp c/q sound would work

aonb

Thats so sweet - a multilingual dog!!

Cheshire Cat

Our dogs are bilingual. English and German. I originally trained them in English, because I thought it would be easier if dog minders etc didn't have to learn German to handle them, then introduced German. They don't seem to have a problem with it.

Graces7

Is it not the tone rather than the words? Or as much as?

razorblunt

It's just words at the end of the day, there's no difference between "sit" and "suigh síos" for a dog. As a family agree on what the commands will be, then train using them.

mvl

thanks guys, took some notes on this (there were couple of things said that may be common sense to experienced dog owners, but are news to me).