My dogs are barkers. I don't mind it but I would like them to stop when I ask them to. An example would be if someone comes to the door. I don't mind them letting me know that someone is there, but once they start barking I cannot get their attention to get them to stop.

Help!

I saw a trainer on tv the other day who trained dogs to stop barking. She started off by saying "bark" when they would bark and she made a hand signal so they learned what barking was. The she asked them to bark and had them keep barking and made a big hand motion and said "silence" (a hand motion like they make when someone is safe in baseball) and gave them a treat when they were quiet. Then she'd have them bark again and do it all over. After some practice she could just say "silence" with the hand motion and the barking would stop.

I like this way because your dog should be allowed to bark to alert you, but then you let them know it's ok to stop. Using the spray bottle method might just make them afraid to bark all together. You don't want to punish them for trying to protect you.

Put food in your hand LOL, nothing gets our dogs attention like Food. If they ran away the squeak of the pantry door opening would bring them right back home. When they are jumping or barking I just walk in by their treat pantry and they follow me right there LOL.  Not the best advice I know!!

What you could try to do is teach them the watch command when it is one on one time with them. I am not sure if you clicker train or not but while you are with them you can reward them with praise or treats everytime they make direct eye contact with you and associate it with the word watch. Then once they learn this command means look at you and good stuff comes their way you can incorporate it to when you really need to use it. Hope that makes some sense.......