Time for a new to-do list!
1. take your dog to a city center, a store that allows dogs (pet store?) and on a train station
2. position yourself next to a high target and now only click for circling all the way to your leg (don't click for steps in between) - name it with heel for one side and something else for the other and have a dog follow your leg when you move in a circle around the target away from the dog - then tell him to come to the other side and have him follow the other leg. Use different targets, try it on a very low one too.
3. build your own cavaletti and walk the dog over it - you can use the drawers or boxes of appropriate size and height, put them in a row and walk the dog through, just as you can see on this video
4. try the other version of 2on2off: instead of having them go on an object and off, stop in a position and wait, let's try stepping back into 2on2off this time. Position your dog close to a low object behind his back, cue him "back" and reward for stepping on an object or trying to. Slowly, you can have a dog step on higher&higher objects, this is beginning of a handstand, but with young puppies, don't overdo the height. Instead, you can have them back up stairs for example, to challenge them some more without making it too physically demanding. You need to build balance and strength slowly enough for the dog to never be sore after. You can also teach them a "pee" trick: click when they heave one leg, searching the object - before they find it and name it, it's a fun one.
5. put your paw target on a drawer or doors or simply shape the paw touch to a drawers/doors and then select for stronger&stronger touches/pushes. The goal is to have the dog slam the doors or drawer with power, to teach them that they control the movement under their feet and the sound and that it's FUN - my favourite trick for a great see-saw!
6. don't forget on recalls and playing!!! Also, slowly add duration to a sit up, teach crossing paws with the other paw and fade the target, check if the puppy will stay in 2on2off position until "go" even with distractions (toys and food flying around)
Have fun!
Final version of 2on2off:
I’m one of the missing videos. Sorry, I’ve been training everyday just had not had time to film and edit. Here is Leia’s Lesson 3.
1. I took her into a pet store last week and she was really good about doing her tricks in the store. I have taken her to Hamilton (the very small capitol city of Bermuda) a handful of times but she could use more experience in busy places. She gets a little overwhelmed by everything going on around her. We don’t have a train on the island but I can take her to the airport and the main ferry terminal. She spends the day with me at agility trials and is relaxed and able to do tricks and play in that environment. She loves all people, children and dogs -- sometimes a little too much in that they become a major distraction for her.
2. We got our full circles in both directions on high and low object, last week (Silvia you saw them on our running contacts video). I’ve started stepping into the circle and clicking for her touching my leg when I move for “side” and “close”. She seems to be getting it. I’m trying to reward high, but I’m not sure if its high enough and my video doesn’t really show my hands. She is still putting her head down between rewards and sometimes her hind end isn’t coming all the way around. What do you think? Are we on the right track?
3. Cavaletti was also on my running contact homework so I didn’t include it here.
4. Leia is backing onto a step but always reaches with her left leg. I have not been focusing on 2on/2off for contacts but, want to work on the pee trick and handstand. I started adding height, I think I went too fast? -- my video was too long so this will be under a separate video.
5. Slamming a door is Leia’s kind of trick! Her way of asking to go outside has always been to slap her paw at the door. She loves pushing things.
6. We’ve been playing a lot and doing recalls on the beach. I’ve been trying to be more consistent about mixing in some toy play with my shaping sessions. I can tell it helps with her focus and enthusiasm for the shaping. I actually have trouble remembering to include it because I’m so used to working with my older food only dog. Bad habit! Leia has good duration in sit-up so I’ve been working on high paws to challenge her balance more. Anything else I should be doing with that one? Paw cross is going well, I’ve faded the target and she does it on cue fairly consistently. I need to work on the other paw crossing over now.
Thanks for watching,
Mara
Very nice! She sure looks to love the salamming! Side and heel look good too, the rewarding is o.k. as her head is vertical. Sometimes you do click too soon, you need to wait she is completely parallel -- mostly she is, but pay attention to it. Why do you think you added height too fast for 2on2off? They mostly have a preference for which leg to step on first. Try setting her diagonally to an object, so that she needs to start with the leg closer to an object.
Thanks Silvia! Yes, she is a slammer. I had a feeling there was something I was doing that was preventing her from doing the heeling just right. I will pay attention to the timing of my clicks to see if I can get her to be more parallel.
Here is the video of my adding height to the 2on2off. Leia did well with the 1st cushion but the 2nd one looks like it was too big a jump in height for her based on her getting a little frustrated with it. I notice that she really does not like to fail or struggle with anything much and will give up much more easily then my other dog. I don’t know if you see this in her from the video’s. With the 2nd cushion I made the mistake of not being ready and missing a couple of clicks in the beginning that also must have contributed to her frustration. I put in a couple of short clips of my older dog’s handstand at the end. If you wouldn’t mind commenting I would love to know what you think of his style and if I should be doing anything differently with him to get more independence.
Thanks!
Mara
Yes, that was too big step forward. The problem is that with one pillow, she can still step on it with one leg and for two, she would need to push up a lot and I don’t think she is ready yet. Try to progress more gradually, the important thing is to find the height where she can still step on it with one leg, but it’s hard enough that she sometimes tries to hop up with both -- jackpot that so that she learns that’s one of the options and only then present her with that much height that she doesn’t have any other option but hopping up. Your other dog is doing great! Sometimes he pushes up not quite high enough to be able to hold it long, but some tries are beautiful -- just slowly select for those to add more duration. But again, don’t overdo it, it’s physically hard for them, so they need the time to build muscle and find balance.
Great, will try all that you suggest.
Thank you!
Mara
Been having problems with my old BC getting in the way when training but wanting him around as a distraction -- so today I gave him his own bucket for circle work and had Tili and Xylo doing full circles at the same time (Xylo very enthusiastically as he was only being rewarded on Tili’s clicks which made him try harder).
Been doing well on most things.
-- been to a shopping center, the middle of town and dog shows
-- have full circles in both directions on various objects in different places and have just started introducing my leg
-- backing up stairs and onto a box, still tending to step up even when fairly high but giving me the occasional pop
-- 2o2o working away at this
-- recalls good even through a crowd of people, on going
-- good sit ups and various waves, a cute nose wiping action has appeared that I am capturing
-- liked the idea of indipentend cavalettis and have been working on this and she is doing well
-- have made little progress with door and draw banging. I have a basic wooden wobble board that she crashes down onto the tile floors with gay abandon so the noise is not an issue.
Will try and get some of this videoed.
Sounds great! Occasional hop up with both legs is good enough, just jackpot it and ‘m sure you’ll be seeing more&more of it. You need to make a video of both of the dogs circling, that sounds fun!
Hi all
I’ve fallin behind, but coming along. Here is where Kinetic and I are at.
Your links don’t work, I hope I found all the videos on your channel. A really nice duration on a sit up! Crossing paws is great too. Focus on pivoting now to get some more fluency to then introduce side and heel position -- this is the trick that we’ll be taking further every lesson, so maybe focus on that one now, you can catch up with the others later. Have fun!
http://m.youtube.com/#/profile?user=workinpaws&v=6vXtEjaaliM&view=videos
http://m.youtube.com/#/profile?user=workinpaws&v=5XRKZPo35pA&view=videos
http://m.youtube.com/#/profile?user=workinpaws&v=_nwCyJTL3sI&view=videos
Hi Silvia,
Finally a video on lesson III! I started on all the basics but nothing is really finalized yet. But we have time for that, right?
The situps and the 2on2off with release are not in the video but we still work on that too. With the start of heel work we still are struggling with the counter wise turns. I have to admit I did not practice it a lot, yet.
The backwards 2on2off… Since I started it on the stairs it was fun to teach Keen to go up the stairs backwards, so I forgot a bit about the real goal of the exercise. I’ll work on it!
For the side and heel position, you need to position yourself more to the side of the target (meaning that you need to move to the other side when you ask her to go to the other side). Standing like you do, you’re actually getting wrong position: front feet are too far ahead and she is curled in towards you. Position yourself so that her legs are parallel to your legs, meaning that her paws are where your heels are and her shoulder is at the side of your knee (not in front) and rear end is straight, not swinging out. Don’t reward anything that is not exactly that position as it’s very hard to get rid of sloppy positions.
Great job with the cavaletti and slamming! Select for even more power and weight on now. Backing up the stairs is very cute too! And sure, no problem to finalize the tricks later. The one we do need for all the next sessions, though, is heel and side, so let’s focus on that one first.
I’ve been sad about our lack of progress this week. I did a few short sessions every day with Tibby this week, but she has been acting strange. Nervous? and zero attention span.
I am hoping it is just a stage that she is going through, or spring fever or the heat (it was 89F here today with 100% humidity). She gets frustrated very easily. I’m trying to not put any pressure on her -- when she gets frustrated I let her do one of her easy favorite tricks and then end the session.
I think we may get the handstand in 2012 or 2013! Will you have a remidial tricks class for slow teams? 🙂
I can’t make Tibby do anything, so if she wants to do it she will, but if she doesn’t…..well, that is the end of it!
I included some of the times when Tibby blows me off (and runs away) or gets frustrated and whines. It doesn’t look like it in the video, but I can tell that she isn’t 100% happy.
After watching the video I can see that Tibby is doing better with her turns on the perch. I saw on the video one time when she offered movement in the other direction, but I missed it. I wait and wait for her to offer movement to the left, but so far I haven’t been able to catch any.
I think we need some help please! 🙂
I agree with Brigit, you actually did TONS of progress!!! Considering how hard it was for Tibby to just sit straight, she already has great duration in a sit up now! Don’t ask for more as she can do for now, just go slowly with it. Back up is great too, it’s very nice to see she still goes crazy for that ball!
If you never worked with her outside before, your choice of tricks was not the best one, you first have to try some playing, then do some of her favourite tricks in between the play and then slowly go from there.
Also, to make backing up on an object easier, find a wider object so that it’s easier to step on it accidentally. 2on2off in the other direction is sure great! For pivoting in the other direction, you can put your target next to the wall, so that she can’t go the whole circle -- maybe she will then step back and you could jackpot that?
Another thing to be careful about is your attitude. It’s probably my fault as I was telling you not to help and not to cheer her into working with you to not push her -- BUT when she IS working with you and offering things, do mark it with excitement! I remember that when Le was a puppy and just started to learn about clicker, I needed to accompany every click with a smile and happy voice. I normally talk to my dogs a lot, so I think she though I’m really weird when I took that clicker and stopped talking -- she though something was wrong. So I first needed to accompany every click with the voice, but then of course slowly reduced it to only go crazy for jackpots. But letting them know you’re impressed by what they’re doing is very important. It’s not to get the action -- it’s to reinforce the action.
“It’s not to get the action – it’s to reinforce the action.”
Ahh, I see. I’ll try to work on that this next week.
After I tried the pivoting with her outside and it didn’t work I thought, “Duh, why didn’t I try something easy first!”. After I could see it wasn’t working I did some food tosses into the grass. She comes to me, I toss a treat, she finds it, comes back to me and we do it again. She thought it was OK, but she would rather be inside. I don’t get it, because we spend a lot of time outside, but not in the backyard, because for the last 2 months it has been really muddy. Before this it was covered in snow and Tibby loved to run around in the backyard then.
Yes Tibby still loves her ball. Although her returns on fetching have gone way down. It’s made out of wool, so she just wants to chew on it.
It’s difficult to watch all the other dogs (who are puppies and younger than Tibby) progressing so much faster than us, but I know that she will get it eventually. Whenever I think we haven’t made any progress I just watch our very first training video http://justatibetanpup.blogspot.com/2010/11/target-practice.html
It reminds me that we have come a long way!
Awwww, Catalina. It’s sad to see and hear you so frustrated. Remember this is FUN! Don’t forget the fun part of Silvia’s trick training. I got too serious for a bit and could see the lack of enthusiasm/ frustration in my dogs. Da Vinci stressed, Cash shut down and Callie got so goofy crazy she wasn’t thinking. We aren’t progressing fast, but we are having fun. Progress IS progress and the relationship is the most important :)! You and Tibby have always been so happy training and playing together. I think it’s important to allow yourself to enjoy this time with Tibby. She loves working with you and pleasing you…that is clear. Once I let go of my “agenda” and focused on the fun, bonding time with my dogs we started progressing much faster. Hang in there! I remind myself often that the dogs won’t be ruined if they never finish a handstand or a paw cross…it’s about the process, learning together and having fun together 🙂
Kristin
Yeap, you definitely did! I think you two are doing GREAT, especially as it’s much harder to keep a Tibet Terrier focused and motivated as a BC… It’s really great you found those balls she goes crazy for… Can you get her to fetch if you have two of them and show her the other one once she gets one?
Thank you for the encouragement Silvia, Kristin and Birgit! It means SO much!!
I think that we might be able to work up to that. With her other toys she is very good at fetching and putting the toy in my hand, but not with these balls.
Last night I tried a little game: When she had one ball I would play like crazy with a 2nd ball. She didn’t want my ball! She was like, “Oh, good you have a ball too. That’s nice.”
Then I started holding the ball when she had it in her mouth and clicking when I felt her release it. Then I would throw the ball.
Then I went back to 2 balls. When she had one I would offer the other one and if she released the 1st one I would throw the 2nd one. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn’t. A couple times she waited for me to throw the 2nd ball and ignored the 1st one, so either she gets the game OR she just likes one ball more than the other one!!! 🙂
🙂 Yes, dogs are funny. Some always only want the toy that they don’t have. And some always only want the toy they have 🙂
Video of us playing with the ball today.
🙂
Hi Catalina, i just watched your video and noticed your frustration. I think your tricks looked nice. Perhaps she isn`t yet used to do tricks outside….and for the movement to the left -- just treat for right without click and click and treat for left. To have more movement you could perhaps throw a treat near to the bowl and when she comes back with her feet on the perch just try to capture her first movements.
And the sit-up. My dog doesn`t sit up such as long as Tibby does. They are young and they need the muscles to sit up longer. Every short sit-up gives more strength to their back muscles. And her “Back” looked great for me too.
Here (hopefully) is a video that shows Xylo, my 10 year old Obedience Champion BC who is a cross over dog doing circle work (he started this at the begining of the year when I first saw Silvia’s heel work DVD), keeping busy while I train Tili on cirlce work and then backing onto objects.
The ‘show me’ is Xylo’s cue for doing something. We did much better when I was not trying to video the action -- I dont do pressure?
We then went to a garden center today and found things to back onto, did a bunny up, a 2o2o and saw budgies for the first time -- for a cattle dog she is finds birds fascinating, need to explain to her she is not a bird dog but a cattle dog -- have not shown her a cow yet so had better do so.
Oh, and I can’t see the video… It says the video is still being processed… Can others see it?
can’t work for me! 🙁
Must be my dyslexia scrambling the letters -- it is there in Youtube
OK its my eyesight trying to read the code 😉 sorry Silvia
Very cute! But yes, the cutest things always happen when there is no camera at hand, I know the problem! The tricks in the store were really cool too, it’s always good to use different objects for the tricks to teach them to generalize! 🙂 No problems with distractions either! 🙂 And definitely very impressed by the birds!