Something you may not know about dogs is that they don’t generalize very well. Context really matters. Telling your dog to sit in the kitchen and to sit in the living room are two different commands.

Service dogs needs to perform consistently no matter when, where, or what their trainer is doing. This means part of Seva’s training is to follow commands in as many locations as I can get her. Also, she should do what I ask whether I’m standing over her, sitting, lying down, or even on the phone.

Here we are practicing some basic commands. Normally, if I get on the floor, it’s to join her on her level, not to give her commands, so it takes a minute for Seva to get in the game. It helps that she was in training mode with her pack on before I got on the floor.