About Clicker Method

 50 reps at 4 months? His brain is still a baby brain. Give him a break. Also, what do you mean when you say things like order or command?

I would keep the training short and fun. Be light hearted; your dog is a puppy, enjoy him while he's young! Don't be so rigid and strict in your training, but keep it consistant and fair.

tiffy

Also, what do you mean when you say things like order or command?

I think they mean "sit" or "down", something like that..? Some people call that a cue (it sounds better).

Also, expecting a 4 month old puppy to be completely housetrained is WAY too much, WAY too soon. This dog is physically and mentally VERY young, still, and you can only expect so much of him.

 It IS tough to teach 2 or 3 behaviors in a row to a young pup.  After all, it would be very hard to teach a three year old child algebra right after addition, and you would likely get the same kind of confusion.  The fact that he kept trying to lie down isn't stupidity or disobedience, it's him trying to figure out what you want.  He's trying hard to learn!  Lighten up - I think that you are expecting way too much too soon.  Try keeping your training sessions short - no more than a few repetitions at a time.  Reward PROGRESS not perfection, and the perfection will eventually come.  Be happy with your dog, not expect him to understand everything like a little robot right away.  He is likely to forget some of his training when he goes through adolescence - so don't get mad, just persevere with gentle training and he will get through it. 

This isn't about a method, this is about unrealistic expectations of what a young dog should be doing!

The others have it right - lighten up on teaching, put your focus towards enjoying your pup for being a pup, as puppyhood lasts only a short time, and it'll be over before you know it! Don't rush things too much, if you relax and realize your pup is being a totally normal pup, then you'll probably find your relationship grows and your pup will learn new things easily. Your pup is probably confused at the drilling, and frustrated that you aren't looking at the world the way he understands it, and it's setting you both up for failure.

Perhaps Dr. Dunbar can do it, but I have certainly never had a completely housebroken, basic obedience trained, 4 month old puppy. I've never had a completely housebroken, reliably obedience trained, 12 month old puppy. Never. They need time, mentally and physically, to mature, before they are totally reliable.

MiSSigNNo

Couriously enough if I say sit or platz he always lie down, while if my gf says sit he sits... so he attends to the order of sit of my gf and to the order of lying down of mine.

jennie_c_d

Perhaps Dr. Dunbar can do it, but I have certainly never had a completely housebroken, basic obedience trained, 4 month old puppy. I've never had a completely housebroken, reliably obedience trained, 12 month old puppy. Never. They need time, mentally and physically, to mature, before they are totally reliable.

Luci, The UD dog on my list, was well and truely house trained by 4 months. Had finished all the obedience classes that i could do by seven months, trialling by 12 months, Tch by 18 months and if i could do it all again i would do it much slower and with even more of a sense of fun.I would never do sessions as long as yours (even with her)  and would take cue discrimination so so slowly (sit, platz etc). Any sign of stress you need to stop. My training sessions with her as an adult dog would not be any where as tough as yours! I go for may be three to four reps of something, play, reward. I use clickers heavily.  And this is a dog that breaks the car door down for the oppurtunity to train. You need to lighten up!!! I am known for being a micro splitter (breaking things down to VERY  small bits).

She is an exceptional dog.

Now my boy Sam... He came to us as a 16 month old. We  struggled over 6-8 months with  toilet training.. He is lightening quick on learning, but is hassled by other dogs around him. He does a lot of stuff, but i take it slow. Love him to bits. He is relaible but it took quite a while,and  to be honest i don't  bother counting. He did some pretty anti social things. I  just enjoy him for the dog he is. The frightening thing is that it is likely that he will be a better performer than Luci.

 I think that as i go on the most important thing in dog training is to lighten up, to learn to play and laugh with your dog. If it is some kind of race or test for both of you why bother?

For performance dogs, i really don't care too much what they learn formally for ages. I just focus on two things, learning to work out what makes them go, and that they believe that i am reliable and trustworthy and a good source of reward.

It sounds like what you are doing is something called mass trialing, where you have him practice the same thing over and over, and the results you are seeing are the types of results that would often be seen from mass trialing. It sounds to me like you are doing a whole bunch of trials of the same thing. Your dog then figures out, I get the click for this thing. He may not be paying attention to what you are saying at all. When you start the next session and he does whatever you practiced last, this would be why. He isn't paying attention to what you are saying, and is just doing whatever worked last. What I would suggest to help this is that you do something called interspersion. Do some quick sessions where he practices everything he already knows. Practice everything he can do in a random order. It might help to write these on cards and shuffle them each time to be sure you are being random.

You can teach a few behaviors in a row, but it may be helpful to take a short break in between. You may also want to develop a signal with him to indicate that you are no longer practicing the previous behavior. With a short break, he may learn that this is a signal that what he had just been trying isn't going to work this time.

I agree with everyone here. Just make sure you aren't click/ treat for something you didn't ask for. When Lilith does this I ignore what she is doing, because I didn't ask for it and I wait for her to do the right one. I also mix it up, I never do things in the same order I previously did.  Sometimes when Lilith gets really excited she'll do several at once so I just have to be patient or take a break and play and try again lol.

I also think the rate a puppy/ dog learns depends largely on the individual, not so much as the age of the dog. I have been clicker training Lilith since the day I brought her home, she is just over ten weeks old now and she can now do at least ten different commands without luring and some of them are pretty reliable already. So it is possible, but like I said, it depends on the individual dog.

Try to have fun with your dog when you train and try not to be disappointed if your puppy doesn't learn things really fast, everything comes with time, patience and consistency.  I never expected Lilith to learn so much so fast or be able to even focus for any length of time at least not until she was older lol. I just want her to have fun with training (which she is) and after seeing how much Lilith loved doing silly tricks and learning, we started to see what else she could do. But Lilith thrives on learning and some dogs may not. So you have to be careful you aren't pushing them too hard or expecting more than they can give, if you do, it won't be fun for anyone.