How to teach a dog to stop jumping up on people

What “four on the floor” actually means

In Proof this is a skill in its own right, because jumping is fixed by paying the floor, not kneeing the chest.

The stages

These steps are a draft pending review by a credentialed trainer. They describe standard positive-reinforcement marker training; the app carries the same notice on every session screen.

1. Stage 1 — Floor pays, jumping doesn’t

   Goal: Dog keeps four feet down while you approach and greet

   1. Approach. The moment front feet leave the floor, stand still and look away — no talk, no push.
   2. Feet back down: mark, and deliver the treat on the floor to keep the head low.
   3. Greet in a squat for small dogs and puppies so the face is reachable without launching.

   If it goes wrong

   • Jumping gets worse before it gets better? That is an extinction burst and it is normal. Hold the line for a week.
   • Dog claws at you when ignored? Step behind a baby gate mid-jump — the greeting simply ends. Return when feet are down.

2. Stage 2 — With visitors

   Goal: Feet stay down for a mildly exciting guest

   1. Brief the guest: attention only lands while feet are down, and it withdraws the instant they are not.
   2. Leash on for the first reps so rehearsing the jump is impossible. Pay the floor fast and often.

   If it goes wrong

   • Grandma insists she doesn’t mind the jumping? She is training your dog. A scatter of treats on the floor at the door outranks her charisma.

How long does it take?

Most foundation skills reach their bar in two to four weeks of short daily sessions. Adolescence can temporarily un-stick anything, which is normal.

Proof does not put a timeline on an individual skill, and neither should anything else — the honest answer depends on the dog in front of you, how often you practise, and where you practise. What it does instead is measure: every session records how many reps landed, so progress is a number rather than a feeling.

Proving it in 3 different places

A behaviour that only works in the kitchen is situational, not trained. Four on the floor counts as proven in Proof once it clears the bar above at the top stage in 3 genuinely different contexts:

• Indoors — the quiet room where everything works
• Garden — outdoors, but home turf
• Street — pavements, traffic, passing people
• Park — other dogs, long grass, real distraction
• Somewhere new — a place the dog has never worked before

Proof also expires. Leave a proven skill for two months without asking for it and it returns to the daily plan as a refresher, because that is what actually happens to trained behaviour.