About us

Who are we?

Puppy School Purley and Apple Tree Dog Training is run by

Emma-Clare. I have Jelly, an Australian Labradoodle, I also have Brock who is a Springer Spaniel.

I specialise in the training of puppies and I am passionate about helping you to give your puppy the best start at this most important time in its life.

Puppy School Purley has been successfully helping owners to train their puppies for over 16 years and under my guidance for 15 years. I am privileged to have trained many hundreds of puppies over this time.

I work for Canine Partners (a charity providing amazing assistance dogs) as Puppy Co-ordinator. I am a qualified Puppy School Tutor, a registered Animal Training Instructor with the Animal Training and Behaviour Council, a full member of the Association of Pet Dog Trainers (01396) and a qualified Registered Veterinary Nurse.

I keep my knowledge of dog training and learning theory absolutely up to date by reading new literature and attending courses by educational and professional institutes and other well known dog trainers.

I am also a busy Mum to 3 young boys and understand the demands and strains of training your dog while juggling family life.

Marta

I have been working with and training dogs pretty much since I finished school so over 10 years now, however it was always for friends, family, and neighbours – I never really thought to make a career out of it. I read all the books and watched all the films and videos that were available to me, Now I research in new publications and attend training courses to stay absolutely up to date with the most current information and methods.

I was helping Emma Claire with her classes since March 2019 and have gone through the same training for puppy training classes, which makes me a fully qualified Puppy School Tutor.

My aim is to undertake the gruelling assessment to become a member of the Association of Pet Dog Trainers as soon as it is possible and I hold myself to their standards until then.

I specialise in puppy training, ensuring the young pups are raised into well behaved family members that bring joy to the people they live with. I strongly believe that prevention is the best way to circumnavigate unwanted behaviours, and puppy training is an ideal way to make this happen. A sure way to develop the bond between the puppy and its human family.

Puppy School

Puppy School UK continues to go from strength to strength under the guidance of Gwen Bailey. Puppy School UK is expanding to train more puppies and owners in our kind, reward based, modern training methods.  We have 53 active tutors in the UK.  All tutors are hand picked and have to undertake training, including rigorous practical projects, before they pass the course and are allowed to run classes. We support each other, offering years of combined experience from behaviour, training and veterinary backgrounds. Over 25,000 puppies have benefited from the Puppy School courses since Puppy School began in 2002.

The classes

Puppy School is a set of 6 puppy training classes lasting 1 hour. The comprehensive programme has been carefully designed to take you through all the obedience basics giving you a good foundation for life with your new puppy or for any dog training sport you choose to do later.

Reward-based puppy training

Only reward-based puppy training methods are used at Puppy School. Treats, toys and praise are used to encourage puppies to be well behaved. No bullying or rough handling is tolerated.

Is it fun?

Puppy School tutors are chosen for their people-skills as well as their puppy training abilities. Encouragement and praise are used to help you acquire the skills you need to train your puppy. No humiliation or shaming of owners will occur and all lessons are fun and sociable with a happy, friendly atmosphere.

Puppy play

Puppies will be allowed to play in carefully controlled small groups to ensure they learn good manners around other puppies, do not get scared, and do not learn to play roughly or aggressively. Puppies will be matched for size, age, and experience, and play will be carefully supervised to ensure that all puppies learn to be confident with others.

Please note that, in some classes, the mix of puppies may make it impossible to conduct puppy play sessions safely. Puppy play session will only be offered if they can be run without causing harm.

Behaviour advice

Throughout the course, your behaviour-trained Puppy School tutor will be on hand to help you with any behaviour problems.

Practice makes perfect

Although all the information you will need to train your puppy will be given to you in class, you will need to set aside time every day to practice the exercises at home to make the most of the ideas you have been given. Training at home will allow you to progress further in class and will result in a better trained puppy at the end of the 6 weeks.

Regular monitoring for Puppy School classes

Classes are monitored regularly to ensure high standards. All Puppy School Tutors are well trained in the latest training techniques, as well as in animal behaviour. Regular refresher courses and an email forum for tutors ensure they stay up-to-date.