Product Description

The Canine Good Citizen class offered by Leerburg will be one evening a week for six consecutive weeks. Classes will be an hour long, but the instructor will arrive a half hour before class and will remain for a half hour after class if students need additional help with an exercise. The final class will be the administration of the test.

Cost for the class includes the fee for the final test.

Requirements for this class: dogs must be at least one year old and have basic obedience skills.

In this class we will polish the skills needed to pass the AKC Canine Good Citizen test. These skills include: accepting and being petted by strangers, walking on a loose leash, walking through a crowd, sit/down/stay/ recall on command, supervised separation, and reaction to other dogs and distractions.

The first night of class, we will demonstrate what a CGC test will look like and what is expected for the dog to earn its certificate/ title. Each exercise will be demonstrated by a dog that has earned her CGC title as well as a Therapy Dog title. We will also begin work on accepting and being petted by strangers and appearance and grooming.

Week 2, we will work on loose leash walking and sit/down/stay/recall on command.

Week 3 will cover reactions to other dogs and distractions.

Week 4 will cover the supervised separation exercise.

Week 5 will be a review for students who feel they need more work on certain test items. If students feel confident, we will hold a “mock” test.

Week 6 will be the test. It will be given in a group environment with each dog demonstrating each of the test items.

About the instructor, Kelly Franks

"I have worked for Leerburg since early spring of 1999. I started in the kennel working hands on with the German Shepherds and Belgian Malinois that were bred there. The dogs taught me a lot about canine body language, psychology, and earning respect. I am also lucky to have learned training techniques directly from some of the best trainers in the world, including Michael Ellis, Ed Frawley, and Cindy Rhodes.

In 2002, I became a “weekend” dog groomer. As a new groomer, I often had dogs referred to me that were too anxious or aggressive for other groomers to want to work on. As a result, I worked closely with owners to help their dogs become desensitized to the grooming process. By making grooming a positive experience for the dogs, we were able to eliminate those problem behaviors.

I started seriously training my own dogs when I acquired my first Belgian Malinois, Toni, at 8 weeks old in 2004. It became clear early on that she was going to require much more time and energy than any of my previous dogs had. Toni and I learned many sports together including Agility, flyball, Mondio Ring, tracking, and scent discrimination. As a distinguished lady of 12, Toni still goes to training with me and shows the new Agility pups what it’s all about.

When Toni’s sister, Caterina, joined our pack in 2007, she expanded my horizons even further with learning about the CGC and Therapy Dog certification, as well as Rally Obedience. Caterina and I were working towards our DSRD (Disaster Stress Relief Dog) certification when she was diagnosed with an Auto-immune disease, and I made the choice not to take her further in training as the stresses of training made her disease more pronounced."

- Kelly Franks