Dogs jump to get attention and most of the time it works great!. It’s hard to ignore a dog when he is knocking you over! However, we can teach him more appropriate ways to get attention with a few simple tricks.
Make sure everyone ignores the dog when they first get home. It’s hard to do but if every time someone walks through the door there is a party with the pooch then we can’t blame him for getting excited and jumping!
If your dog does jump, say no as you firmly walk into him (don’t raise your knee just take a few firm steps forward). This clearly tells your dog that you don’t like what he just did. Plus, if he is backing up to get out of your way, he can’t rebalance and jump again. The only feed back Bubba, should get from you is the No. If you start to lecture him or give him any eye contact, he may confuse your NO for a YES since he got your attention when he jumped.
When he stops jumping, lavishly, but calmly, praise him. This will teach him that jumping equals correction but all four paws on the ground means he gets all the love he was looking for in the first place.
Most importantly, as you work on this jumping, we are also going to teach him that sitting is the absolute best thing to do in the whole world. If he is constantly and consistently rewarded for sitting he will learn that sitting is the best way to get attention. Makes sure to reward him (even with a simple “good boy”) every time he sits. Even if he just wanders into the room and sits down, stop what you are doing and praise him. If he sits next to you when you are talking to someone, briefly stop the conversation and tell him good boy. All of this positive reinforcement for sitting will decrease his frequency of jumping because it will teach him how to be polite in order to get attention.