A lot of work for both of you but the dog will love it. You are late though, ideally you start them super early and work with them as much as possible before 6 months, after that they become stupid distracted teenagers and then adults at around 2. They are high drive dogs though, so they will learn at any age, it will just take a lot of dedication and lunch meat. They usually have a ton of energy and intelligence (highly correlated in dogs) so they learn quick but sometimes you have to tire them out a bit first if they can't stay still and focus. They crave structure more than other dogs, In the absence of work/direction they train routines and make associations for themselves. They will suss out any pattern that effects them day to day intentional or not. They generally have really great recall and won't wander too far afield (they are bred to work near you and your herd), I take mine for early morning walks when the park is empty and she will wander off into the woods but she always keeps me within earshot and most of the time she is either 40 feet in front of me or 40 feet behind sniffing somehting. With herders positive training works best as they are very sensitive to discipline and they have naturally high drive/will to please. I still use negative training in the moment (for things like food thievery) but generally you want to incremental-ize everything into small games with tangible rewards. When the dog is going to do something wrong you ask it to do something right instead like "down" or "come" or "leave it" if the dog gives up a piece of fallen chicken in this fashion you reward him/her with the chicken and then some (at least for training purposes). You first need to teach the dog that listening to you is fun and it results in good things happening. When the dog runs off it's too late to teach it about it's borders at that moment, you call it back and when it comes back you reward it and act like it did nothing wrong. The next day you work on stay and come and where the line is. This is so paramount with herders, you never want to scold them for leaving upon return because then they will only learn that returning is bad and you will never, ever catch a fucking border or aussie. With positive training you have to prepare in advance for situations. The dog has no concept of the past, if it pees on the carpet you have two to six seconds to scold it, otherwise it will think you are just a crazy asshole yelling at it for standing around. Instead you have to take it out every 2 hours and treat it when it pisses in the grass, don't teach it that pissing on the carpet is bad, teach it that pissing outside is so great that it would be stupid to piss anywhere else. Even if a dog knows something you still have to train the three Ds distance, distraction and duration. Most dogs will sit and stay for a brief period but if you want them to stay put for 30 minutes at a time you have to work up to it. My dog will play fetch all day inside but outside she won't return the ball, this is because of both distance (from me) and distraction (dogs see all activity within the context of environment, this is why a dog who is well trained at home will seemingly "forget everything it knows" at the park). High distraction environments demand high quality rewards when training. Large feats of self discipline require equally epic rewards ('bully sticks' keep them busy for like an hour BTW she looses her mind for bull dick) You need some tools: A 'flirt pole' : Tie a rope toy to a stretchy rope then run it through 4 feet of PVC and tie it off on the other end, bam outdoor cat toy for dogs. When you can't walk em or you need to bleed off some energy so they don't destroy your house use it. They do flips and shit chasing it around pulling it out of the air and you can drain them quickly and with little effort on your part (They recover quick but making sure they aren't brimming with energy is key with herders both for training and making a well adjusted dog). A clicker : Most trainers recommend clickers but that comes from dolphin training the navy did where clicks and whistles travel better in water and I suspect most of them do it because they are training the people and the clicker serves as a reminder to praise/reward the dog. You can use one but I can't be bothered to have more shit in my pockets/hands so I just use a very consistent word/phrase/sound that the dog won't hear in any other context. In my case I just say "guh gurl" in an exaggerated way, as long as your are consistent that is all that matters. A dry bag : filled 50-75% with kibble and the rest with small training treats. You should pretty much always have this on you, when the dog is doing something you want it do (laying calmly beside your desk, laying in the corner of the dinning room, following you around the yard) you toss it some of it's normal food ration this is called 'capture' because you are capturing unprompted behaviors. Sometimes it will get a training treat in the mix, this small bonus keeps them interested. You can also work in more grand rewards when they exceed expectation (this is called 'jackpotting' and helps them hone in on the task and stay motivated). When you are at home you should be asking them to do all the commands they know throughout the day and be trying to empty this bag. A wet bag : filled with hard cheese, lunch meat, hot dog bits, chicken bits, etc. (I just grab leftover protein from dinner and cut it up small, the more variety the better). This is your heavy ordinance, you take this to the dog park, out in public, at home depot, when you have guests... This is what you use to breakthrough when those Three D's are proving tough. Just cut it real small to keep the calories in check, it's about the scent, the dog will gladly work for even the tiniest nibbles. You can also alternate between bags. At this point you are thinking "Man this guy is just a treat dispenser" and yes at this stage you are but if you repeat this stuff enough it becomes second nature to the dog. Eventually you start chaining commands and then not rewarding every time. You still want to work with them and reward them from time to time to keep them guessing and to keep it fun but you'll be able to leave the bag at home. That's pretty much all of the philosophy of it, the rest is just training the commands, you should always have a unique hand signal for each command, dogs don't differentiate words that well but they can read body language very well and hand signs are very simple for them to grasp. It's also nice because you can covertly give them orders. Most more advanced commands have steps for instance "Leave it" starts with holding out food in an open palm and when the dog tries to take the food you close it, when the dog learns to stand back and wait you praise it and give it the food, you repeat this 20 times a day for a few days when the dog actively avoids the food (moves away when you bring it closer) you move on to step two and start placing it on the ground, snatch it back up if the dog tries to grab it, you keep upping the stakes in this way and eventually the dog learns to leave the food. This is how people can stack treats on a dogs paws or nose. You can also train them to look at you for approval before grabbing the food by waiting for them to make eye contact before saying "get it" and allowing them the food. This is one of the best things to train with a herder as it helps them build self control. I've already written an essay but herders love training and tricks so you should look up tutorials online and try them out (Stonnie linked below will help with that) . Start with 'sit', 'down', 'come' (and with a whistle too), 'stay', 'leave it', 'focus' (look at me) and 'look' (look where I'm pointing), as well as 'heel' (a hard one) and then you can move into fun stuff like 'jump', 'spin', 'rollover', 'shake', 'speak'/'quiet' (they are taught together), or proper herding stuff like 'away', 'come by' and place training... I would add a new command every two weeks or so and ask them to go through everything they know once a day or so. I took mine to a puppy class just for the (D)istraction and the exposure to other dogs but this book covers most everything they will teach you and more (most of what I have said is elaborated on here in great detail): https://books.google.com/books/about/TEACH_YOUR_HERDING_BREED_TO_BE_A_GREAT_C.html?id=tQS4CgAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&gboemv=1 Also check out https://youtube.com/c/StonnieDennis for live action tutorials and demos, he's probably the most based dog trainer on the web, he get's into the nitty gritty and he's not some dramatized British cunt nor is he a beaner with 20 year old 'dominance based' methodology or some substance-less show off trick channel.