Are you looking for something to do this winter with your puppy or older dog that requires very little space? Well, I have the answer! Teach your dog some new tricks or polish the old. Teaching tricks is a great way to have fun with your dog, improve your training and even earn titles in organizations such as AKC and DMWYD.
Tricks like hand touches, spins, weaving through your legs, 4 paws in a box, play bow, “feet” behaviors, turning on a perch, backup etc. can be taught with a combination of luring, physical cues, shaping and the use of props so you can get quick results. Then you have the option to polish the tricks by putting them on verbal cues or combining them into “routines”.
Here are some of the benefits of teaching tricks.
Teaching tricks creates a “thinking” dog and builds confidence. It allows the dog to learn to make good choices. Read about how important that is in a previous post. Learning through choices
Teaching tricks improves our dog training skills – both observational skills and mechanics – the act of getting reinforcement to the dog at the right time and place.
Trick behaviors can be used for conditioning, body awareness and improving flexibility in your dog. If your dog gets injured like my dog Nick recently did, having a set of trick behaviors to rely on can be very helpful with rehabilitation exercises.
If you are involved in a dog sport, it is useful to take that “trick training” mindset to sports like agility and obedience. Thinking of sports behaviors like line-ups, stays, heeling, collected jumping, weaving or contact behaviors as “tricks” keeps it fun for both handler and dog. In fact, may of the foundation behaviors for those skills look like tricks!
Even a small repertoire of tricks will impress family and friends!
What’s not to like about teaching tricks? Last spring, Nick and I had fun meeting the requirements for the DMWYD Advanced Trick Dog title. Check it out….NICK’s ADVANCED TRICK DOG VIDEO
I’m sure some of you are avid trick trainers. I’d love to hear (or see) why you like teaching tricks and the benefits it brings to you and your dogs. If you need help getting started, there are tons of resources online or reach out to me. I’m teaching privates and semi-privates this winter.
This is the third in a series of posts that explore the “little things” that lead to big improvements in agility AND your relationship with your dog.
A young puppy is a learning machine. And one of the biggest lessons it will learn from you is HOW to learn. We want the puppy to learn that good CHOICES earn reinforcement, whether it is being reinforced for checking in with you when taking a mini-walk in the back yard, or for a specific behavior like a sit or a down. Teaching trick behaviors is a great way to approach this because it encourages the puppy to try and rewards the “good” choices the puppy makes. It lays the groundwork for future work by building confidence in the puppy that it can elicit reinforcement through its choices. And the trainer is more relaxed because there are just fun games to play with the puppy.
Marking the good choices is the key to communicating with the puppy. Whether you use a clicker, a consistent verbal marker like “Yes!” or “Yip!”, or simply get reinforcement into the dog quickly, it’s capturing the moment of the good CHOICE that makes the difference. The puppy learns quickly that the mark is followed by a reward.
My Sheltie Lacey was easy to teach tricks because I conditioned her from 8 or 9 weeks old to understand that an audible marker (click or “yes!) meant “that’s a good choice!” (and would get a cookie). She was a very active and quick dog that offered a lot of behaviors that I could capture like rolling over and leaping in the air or rotating on a perch. Once she was rewarded for the behavior she offered it again and that led to being able to put these trick behaviors on “cue”.
But Lacey was also quite independent and confident. To put it bluntly, she didn’t need me that much at first. If nothing else was going on, she was happy to do anything I asked but if we were outside or other dogs were around, I more or less disappeared from her consciousness. Teaching Lacey a reliable recall was a long-term project. And for a while, she mastered the Sheltie “you can’t catch me” game, so early mornings she was on a long-line even in the fenced back yard. This was to ensure that I could get to work on time!
Lacey taught me a lot. I had to figure out how to increase my value to her and change her mindset to make the choice to be with me. I eventually realized that the key to building that value was not to strictly limit her freedom but to let her know she could have that freedom even after she checked in with me. Checking in meant a cookie and praise because that was what she found valuable. Toy play wasn’t a good choice for Lacey (but was a good choice for my border collie Nick). So, we did lots
of off-leash walks in safe places (sometimes with a long line) letting her choose to check in with me, get her reward and still have her freedom. During nice weather, I left the back door open to our fenced yard and went about my business in the house, letting her come find me, get a cookie and praise and then she could choose to go back out again.
I could relate many Lacey stories but the key point I want to get across is the importance of rewarding the puppy’s good choices and how that can shape the behaviors you want while instilling confidence in the puppy and improving your relationship. The earlier you establish that the puppy’s choices get rewarded, the easier it is to set up your puppy for success and to mark and reward the behaviors you want to be repeated. It lays the groundwork for all of your future training.
Now, back to how setting the dog up for the right choice can help teach behaviors. Four paws in a box is an example of a simple trick that many people teach their puppies. The key is to setup the environment to allow the puppy to be successful with very little effort. So using a box bigger than the puppy with low sides increases the probability that the puppy will step inside the box on its own* and that “choice” can be marked and rewarded. From there, the trainer can use smaller boxes to challenge the puppy to work a little harder for its reward and increase the pup’s understanding of the desired behavior. *I would not be above throwing a cookie in the box one or two times to encourage interaction.
Here is another example: A “trick” I taught Nick as a winter project was hitting a target with four paws. This is a foundation behavior for teaching running contacts that I learned from Justine Davenport of Shape Up! Dog Training. The early stages provide a good example of setting up the environment for success. In this session, I was teaching Nick to go back and forth from bowl to bowl while going around an object. At first the object was so close to me that he had little choice but to go around it. I incrementally moved the object farther away from me and added a second object so that he now had a choice to go between me and the objects and was only rewarded when he made the correct choice. You can see how smoothly this session went and how quickly he progressed. No luring, no corrections. Just setting him up to be “right” while still leaving the door open to be “wrong”. That is how learning happens!
It’s up to us as trainers to give our dogs every opportunity to make good choices while they are learning new behaviors. Controlling the environment and limiting the puppy’s options to increase the probability of good choices is the key to success. While this is one of the “little things” that I included in this article series, it is actually a really BIG thing for your dog’s training success. Happy Training!
After many months of not teaching due to the health crisis I’m offering online and in-person private/semi-private lessons starting now for online lessons and October 31st in-person. Why? Because I genuinely enjoy helping teams achieve their best through good training and consistent handling that builds a solid foundation, and is fun for both handler and dog. I have loads of experience and insight that I’ve built over 20 years of training and want to share a bit with you! I specialize in training for agility and am also happy to work foundation skills for dogs destined for any sport.
Online lessons will be held via Zoom, messenger or phone. In person lessons will be held in Honeoye Falls at Savvy Dog Sports. Here is where you can learn more about me and my dogs.
Why take a private or semi-private lesson?
Private or semi-private lessons (2-3) are ideal to practice the three F’s:
Focus – Come to your lesson with specific goal/question (or get help in establishing them) and use the time with me to give it your full attention.
Feedback – Get expert, experienced feedback to adjust, try something new or problem solve. With over 20 years dog training/teaching and learning, I’ve seen a lot!
Fix-it – Try again and see the improvement OR ask the next question.
You may be training on your own, taking a local class or have registered for an online class. These private/semi-private lessons will supplement that instruction and give you more 1:1 time, an experienced eye for problem solving or confirmation that you are on the right track in your training.
Or, you and a couple of friends who have puppies or dogs at the same level may want to get together to arrange for some small focused class time.
How can I help? Here is an example. Recently a friend who is taking both in-person and online classes was scratching her head about the behavior of her young dog in a class situation. After a few diagnostics (Focus), we figured out the problem (Feedback), adjusted her reinforcement, got success and a plan to improve her dog’s understanding (Fix-it). Yay!
Possible Topics
Foundations such as effective use of rewards, its your choice games, handling flatwork – such as recalls and circle work, or teaching impulse control. Or simply answering this question: “I have a new puppy…what do I do now?”
Wing work – teaching collection and verbals
One-two jump work for teaching commitment or jumping skills such as collection and extension
Tunnel skills including threadles
Teaching and/or proofing verbal cues
Weave entries/exits
3 or 4 jump handling drills
Teaching the 2on2off behavior using props such as a target plank
Lesson Options
Online Private Lesson:
Online private lessons can be effective using Zoom conference. Using Zoom gives us the option of sharing videos, course maps, drawing on a whiteboard, or even a live demo. Video analysis of course runs or evaluating training clips is perfect for this format. Other formats are possible as well. These lessons can be scheduled for 30 minute or 60 minute blocks or by subscription…buy one hour of consults and use it to ask questions, submit videos for review, etc as you progress through your training. Cost $60/hour.
In-Person Lessons at Saavy Dog Sports*:
For now, I’ve blocked out some Saturdays and Sundays starting Oct 31st, but other options may be available as well.
In person Private Lesson – 1:1 session with you and one or more dogs. Cost $75/hour
In person Semi-Private Lesson – Arrange to come with a friend or two for a semi-private lesson. Up to 3 teams. Cost $80.
In person Semi-private Lessons can be extended to 90 minutes for $120.
*Saavy Dog Sports has crown matting and an approximate 40 x 60 ft working space. Large enough for small sequences and all Foundation work.
I would love to work with you; contact me via e-mail or messenger to schedule a lesson.
This is the second in a series of posts that explore the “little things” that lead to big improvements in agility AND your relationship with your dog.
Everyone understands the importance of recalls in training a puppy. I’m going to make the case in this article that recalls build a great relationship with your dog AND can be a strategic part of your agility training throughout the dog’s career.
Puppy recalls
Why is recall training so important? It teaches the puppy its name, builds a solid foundation for your relationship, develops pack behavior and it encourages the puppy to follow you.
Practicing recalls with a young puppy teaches it that coming to you results in very good things – cookies, toy play, praise, petting. The value of an instant response when the puppy hears its name are many…the most important being safety – think of a dog running toward a busy road. And in everyday life, a great recall is worth its weight in gold.
The perfect recall – that we all strive for! – means that the puppy will come when you call its name (or other cue that you have established) regardless of distraction. It’s another VERBAL CUE that should be taught deliberately, thoroughly proofed and protected!
When approaching your recall training:
Be Deliberate: Include specific recall training in your daily time spent with the puppy.
Build on Good Choices: Allow the puppy to CHOOSE to come to you. My rule of thumb is to give my puppy enough freedom to allow for choices but limit the choices so that there is a very good chance of success and of course, keep the puppy safe.
Be Strategic: Gradually and strategically introduce recall training in different environments and with varied distractions. I raise my chance of success by controlling the environment and level of distraction. Examples of controlling the environment are indoor spaces, fenced outdoor spaces, leashes, long lines, etc. I want my puppy to be rewarded for good choices so I limit his options appropriate for the stage of his training.
Protect the Verbal Recall Cue: I have one ironclad rule in training my puppy’s recall…I only call the puppy’s NAME (my recall cue) when I am 90%+ sure he will come! If my 9 week old puppy is having playtime and is fully engaged with another puppy, I’m not going to call the puppy. If my 16 week old puppy is in the same situation, I might get in close and call him. But if I call once and the puppy doesn’t come, I DO NOT call again. I move closer, use my generic “pup-pup” word, might gently tap the puppy’s butt to get his attention or hold a cookie near his ear, then say his name. I might call “pup-pup” and run away to get a chase response. When the puppy CHOOSES to respond, that response gets an immediate mark (yes or click) and reward. Why not call the name more than once? This is very important! If I say the dog’s name over and over again and he doesn’t respond, I am teaching him to ignore me! The verbal cue of your dog’s name becomes meaningless. Note: This rule goes out the window if safety is involved!
When practicing recalls, only call your puppy ONCE and mark the CHOICE the puppy has made to come to you.
I am not going to go into detail about all the recall games I play with my puppies because there are tons of online resources on this topic. Instead, I want to draw the dots between this early training and success in other aspects of your future agility star.
Photo by Dianne Spring
Recalls for Agility and Life
I incorporate a lot of chase games into my recall training. Running away after calling the puppy’s name (or release cue) builds drive to come to me quickly. I look over my shoulder as I move away and reward the puppy when he catches up helping him learn to come up on the side that is facing him. This is the beginning of my agility handling training!
It’s a good idea to hold your reward in the opposite hand, like Barb is doing, so that the dog is coming to YOU, not a dangling toy or obvious food reward. Switch the reward to the dog-side hand as the dog reaches you.
What I do when the puppy gets to me on the recall is used to introduce important concepts of agility handling. Essentially, I want my puppy to learn: 1) Always come up on the side that is facing you 2) When I run, you run; 3) When I stop, you stop; 4) When I turn, you turn. These types of lessons are perfect for restrained recalls (where another person holds the puppy) and the puppy is released on the call of its name, not the release cue. As the puppy matures and develops impulse control, the recalls can start with a stationary behavior (sit, down, stand) and the use of a separate release cue (see the first post in this series).
I bucket my recalls like this:
When I run, you run (acceleration): Lead out in “game on” position (like Barb is doing in the picture above). Release and start running. Throw the reward ahead in a straight line as the dog gets near me. The puppy has learned that as long as I keep running he should too. The verbal “GO” can be added into this recall.
When I stop, you stop (deceleration): Lead out in “stationary” position. Release the puppy and stand still. Reward when the puppy reaches me. The puppy has learned that he should “dig in” and stop when I am stationary. There are several variations of this type of stationary recall, including running first and then stopping. I can either be facing in the same direction of the puppy or I can turn and face the puppy. The verbal collection cue (e.g. “dig-dig”) can be added into this recall.
When I turn, you turn: Lead out in “game on” position. Release and start running. As the puppy gets near me, I turn away from the puppy, tapping my leg to keep the puppy on the recall side and saying his name (or bypass cue) to keep him with me. Effectively executing a post turn or teaching the beginning of a bypass cue.
Come up on the new side: Lead out in “game on” position. Release and start running. As the puppy gets near me, I turn into the puppy, effectively executing a front cross. Or, way before the puppy reaches me, I turn away from the puppy and present a new side, effectively executing a blind cross.
With these recalls, I have taught the puppy all the handling elements that he will respond to on course! For some of these recalls, there is more foundation work separate from the recalls, like teaching the dog about reinforcement zone and working separately on circle work. But that is for another post. All of these recalls can be adapted to either wing work or one/two jump work as your dog progresses.
Revisit these recalls throughout the dog’s career as a great way to reinforce early lessons and warm up both you and your dog.
The main message of this post is to FREQUENTLY revisit your recalls throughout your dog’s career. You will continue to put value into your relationship, your dog’s response to your most basic handling cues and practice your stays. What better way to warm-up both you and your dog before training than to strategically practice your recalls (and circle work)? Make it a habit and you will keep your dog’s response to your acceleration, deceleration and turning cues sharp throughout his career.
This is the first in a series of posts that explore the “little things” that lead to big improvements in agility AND your relationship with your dog.
In this post, I’m going to make the case that teaching a verbal release word is one of the first things you should teach your puppy and is critical to building impulse control and therefore teaching stationary behaviors like a sit-stay or independent stop on a contact.
When do I start?
Right away! When I bring a puppy home and know its comfortable in its new environment, we play games that include a lot of physical play and tons of reinforcement with food, toys and interaction with me. During these play sessions I introduce my release word. Usually it goes like this…play, play, play…PAUSE. Wait for a behavior….Often the puppy will sit but it’s ok if the puppy just pauses too. I then immediately say the word (without moving) and immediately re-engage with the puppy. As I build on those experiences and get the puppy to offer stationary behaviors like sit, down, stand, stay in crate, wait at door, etc., I consistently use my release word. I choose a word that I don’t use often in everyday life. For a while now, I’ve used the word “Break” and it seems to work well. But any word that isn’t used often in everyday speech and doesn’t sound like your other planned verbal skills will work.
For a very young puppy, the “wait for release” might be just a second or two. But the experience of and reinforcement for choosing to wait until the verbal cue is given is HUGE! Once the word is given and the puppy “breaks”, it is immediately reinforced with a cookie, a chase game, engagement with the toy or other fun activity. That’s right…the puppy is rewarded for “breaking” but ONLY when it hears the magic word! This is great practice for building impulse control!
The release word is a verbal cue
Verbal cues are all the rage in agility these days. Do you think of your release word as a verbal cue? You should! A release word is the first verbal cue I teach my puppies and as with other verbal cues, I work toward building an understanding of the cue independent of my motion or other physical cues. After all, on an agility course I need to be moving while the dog is stationary as I lead out or run past the dog who has stopped at the end of the contact. I can make a case that if you are going to teach – and proof – just one verbal cue, the release word should be it. Other than the dog’s name of course!
Why is teaching verbal cues so hard? Dogs are naturally way more tuned into physical cues and motion than they are to verbal cues. Without a clear understanding of the verbal release cue, the dog will be looking for ANY physical cue to end the stationary behavior. You might imagine the dog guessing…Do I leave when she takes a step? Can I leave when she flicks her hand? When she leans away? When she stops and then starts again? The tension builds the longer this guessing game goes on until the dog is shifting around or breaking his stay. It is **very** important that you do not consistently pair physical motion with your verbal release cue. At first, isolate the release word from any motion, then add “nonsense” motion to help the dog understand that the release is on the WORD, not the motion. It is a good idea to video some of your training sessions so you can verify that you have isolated the verbal cue.
Not having a well understood verbal release cue makes it very difficult to put any kind of duration or independence on stationary behaviors like a sit-stay or target behavior on contacts, no matter how often you reward in place. For some high-drive dogs, it makes it almost impossible. For softer dogs, the confusion of not knowing when to leave takes a little bit of their spark away.
What about rewarding in place?
When building duration in stationary behaviors I will reward in place but I’m careful to maintain the understanding that the behavior ends when I give the verbal release cue, not when I stop delivering cookies.
More than one release cue?
You can definitely have more than one release cue. My release word means – end the current behavior and come to me OR do the next behavior that I’ve cued. As I add other well trained verbal cues, I can use them as release cues. “Get it” – to release to a toy; or “Down” from a “Sit”. Or cue an obstacle like a jump (“Hup”) or “Tunnel” from the start line or a stopped contact.
Keep the game going
I like playing little games with my dogs into their adulthood that incorporate foundation skills. These games are engaging, low impact and reinforce necessary skills. I’ve included a short session with Nick at the link below. Here, I apply a mental model I call the “Even When” game. Can Nick maintain his sit or down stay and wait for the verbal release even when I am flapping my arms? Even when I stop and start again in my lead-out? Even when I give a different word? Even when I run hard? Even when I throw a ball in front of his face? As a mature dog, Nick is pretty good at this game. For a puppy, the “even when” criteria are introduced gradually, allowing the pup to be “mostly” successful. A little failure is necessary to learning, after all!
I’d love to hear your thoughts on this topic! Does it make sense? Do you think this approach could help your dog develop impulse control more easily and streamline your training?
