You only take your dog on a walk if he is calm and will walk at your side as you wish. You are ready to go on your walk and get your lead out. If this is a signal to your dog to get over excited and jumping about it - you stop it by putting the lead back in the draw and go away and ignore your dog. You make the decision that the walk will not go ahead until your dog is calm. Don't spoil your walk before it starts by going out with your dog in this excited state.

Do allow your dog to behave like this because if you allow it, by going on your walk, you are just reinforcing the wrong message in your dog's mind. He has the message we get excited and jump around when we go on our walk. No it is not, you must correct this behaviour!

Your dog must get the same message on every occasion: over excitement is not acceptable. Excitement mean he does not get what he want - his walk.

So point one: no walk until your dog is calm. It's quite easy to do this: all you need to do is reward the behaviour that you want to see repeated, and stop all progress toward the door whenever he starts to get excited. I said you needed some time to do this. Be patient, your dog will get the message eventually!

Get him to sit and stay while you get out and put on his lead. If he can't contain himself and starts getting excited again, don't worry. Just take the lead off, if you got that far, turn around and go and put the lead away and ignore him. You are training him that his over excitement means the walk stops before it even gets started. Once he's calmed down and sitting down you can try again. Repeat this as many times as you need to, until you can put on his lead and he remains seated.

A note about the type of lead to use here. A six foot standard lead is the best to use for walking your dog. Retractable leads and longer or shorter leads all will bring about their own difficulties on the walk.

Point two - walk the few paces to the door - no excitement. Any excitement from your dog means, you guessed it, the walk stops. You will have to start all over again from the beginning.

The aim now is to get to the door and get your dog to sit and wait for you to open the door. You should be able to open the door, your dog sitting at your side waiting for your instruction to start the walk. When everything is ready say "heel" and step outside the door.

Stop outside the door, have your dog sit again while you close the door behind you. Success you are in the outside world. You and your dog are now ready to go on your walk.

If at any stage of trying to follow this procedure your dog get excited pulls or does not act in a calm manner - have you got it yet? Yes, the walk ends. Back inside, take off the lead and wait for calmness to return before you start again.

It will probably be as frustrating for you as for your dog at first but please just stick with it you will get there - outside the door I mean. If you have a particularly difficult dog take it in small steps. However many times and however long it takes you must end on success. If you can only get as far as putting on the lead whilst your dog is sitting still and calm - stop there and play with your dog as the reward. Tomorrow get that far again and then move to the door. Succeed in getting to the door, end the session there and reward the dog then with playing a game or with some other treat.

Build it up gradually, you are the person who knows your dog best. Be patient and consistent, you and your dog will get there in the end.

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Roy Dickinson of http://www.totrainmydog.com, is a dog trainer of many years as well a writer. He'll help you find those little tips and tricks to make your dog training easier. You'll find many of these tips and other information on his website To Train My Dog.