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Since this is my first online class, can I please have some clarification when class ends? Is this Wednesday the last day of your help? I saw there are two “catch up” weeks. I just want to make sure I understand when those are. I’m a little panicky that I won’t be able to get the last two lessons in game 4 done by Wednesday!! I’ve been trying to stay diligent and on top of each week but I’m a day or two behind this week because of being out of town! Thank you!!
Okay, so I watched the competition track for deliberate connection. That makes more sense. The Max Pup track is just the basic basic basic foundation of the backside in motion. I also can’t imagine getting that skilled. lol Right now my older dog can do backsides but definitely not as I continue to run forward to a different line like you did. Just gotta do a lot of practice!
I think I know the answer to this question but I’m going to ask anyway just to talk it out. So the “get out” command wouldn’t work here because it doesn’t tell the dog to jump after going around the wing, right? I know the “get out” was to get the dog to kind of move away laterally and take whatever obstacle is out there. It just seems like a very similar movement. Obviously, when we said get out we weren’t having them go around a wing and then jump it. So I can differentiate between the two. I was just curious because they also seem similar.
In these videos, I was using boiled turkey! I got a whole bunch of turkey and chicken to cook and freeze. I was rotating between those chunks of meat, string cheese, and deli turkey meat. When should I use lower value like freeze dried liver and when should I use higher value like cheese or meat?
The hard part for me is, my older dog I started agility with just 1 year ago as a new 5 year old. I did other things with her as a young dog but those things are so far removed that I don’t remember the teenage brain phase. I also didn’t experience the same learning curves with her that I have with Kashia since she was already mature, had already done some other disciplines, and caught on pretty quickly. Don’t get me wrong, she was by no means perfect and we had our struggles. It was just different struggles because she was mature during her initial agility foundation.
I see two more of your classes posted! Knowing what you’ve seen for Kashia’s skill level, what class would you say is best suited for her?
Thanks for all the help!
Your feedback was great!
So this time on deliberate disconnection 1, I threw the toy by the first wing like you said. I rewatched your videos but I’m still kind of confused what we are trying to get out of this exercise? It just seems simple? Or like I’m not really sure what I’m supposed to accomplish long term? I mean I know what a backside is. But I’m struggling to correlate it exactly. Should I be telling Kashia “backside” so she gets used to the command?
Deliberate disconnection 2 went fabulous today! I originally wasn’t going to practice it today to give Kashia a few days to stew but then I said, “eh, why not! I’ll give it a short go to feel her out.” It’s just like you said! Something in her little puppy brain clicked and she did it great! I broke it down like you said and we went really slow. She caught on right away and did awesome. I kept the reps light so I wouldn’t screw anything up and she did good every time! I had a few silly mistakes in the sends around the cones but I just got a little complacent in my handling there. I knew how to fix that right away.
Anyway, all the reps are sequential even though I edited the video to keep the fluff out. I thought Kashia did really well!
I’m also attaching a video of the extreme connection take 2 after some of the advice you gave about the speed circle. I think I only did a total of 4 reps but Kashia did good on all of them! It was hard to keep my verbal praise down but I did my best and she seemed to read it pretty well!
It’s so funny how she has such drastic days in her training attitude. Obviously we all do and they are no different than humans with good days and bad days. It’s just a little harder with a puppy who has a little bit less consistency than the older dogs. lol And yes, you are correct, she’s 18 months on Tuesday!
Thanks for all your help! I’m really going to miss this class! It’s been so fun having lessons and getting feedback!
Help! I need help! I’m not sure what went wrong or if I just totally bombed the exercise all together!!
Game 1 felt too simple. Like I was doing something wrong because it was too simple. I didn’t do it much because she seemed to get it unless we did it wrong??
Game 2 started out good but then her second rep of her left side just went to crap. I have zero clue what I did to cause this but she went to the outside of the wings to go around them before running straight to get her toy. Even though I edited out the lollygagging in these videos, they are all still sequential. I started with the poles set because I figured it would be it more fun being she’s been jumping. Once we started getting failure reps, I moved it to just poles with no more success than before. The right side she did great. No issues. But the left was atrocious. Please help me! My other dog did it right every rep so I can’t figure out what I did wrong with Kashia. I ended up going slower and pointing at the jumps to get her to go through them. Which that’s obviously not disconnection but I wanted some success and to be clear that she can run between the two wings.
Thank you for your help!
Hello! Thank you for the feedback!
<<<<<You were starting to add in a lot of praise and good girl moments, but I think that confused her: she was not sure if she should come to you or keep going. Yo can see it at :58 for example.>>>>>
Interesting observation! I definitely didn’t think about it like that. I was just thinking lots of praise and talking would excite her more and reassure her she is doing good and it’s fun! I guess not if she’s acting more confused than excited! lol I will tone it down! Stick to the facts!
<<<<<This is good to know – Kashia likes info and facts, not praise LOL! So make sure you are using verbal directionals and obstacle names rather than praise.>>>>>
So for the speed circle, when you are simply running around the wings, do you use any verbal command? This got me confused because both dogs looked at me like, ‘what do you want?’, when I started running the circle. It’s like they didn’t know if they were supposed to go on the outside of the wing or follow me on the inside of the wing. Is there a verbal for that? Or how do I tell the dog the outside of the wing being we’ve never done a drill like this and it’s clearly not a jump. Is it just my hand and body positioning that should tell them that?
Kashia had great energy today when we went to the agility arena to practice contacts. So I think it was a combo of boredom and being wiped out! She sure keeps me on my toes having to change the lesson every day!
<<<<I think she was conflicted: get out to the wing, or stay with the reward near you 🙂 So to help her want to leave you for the wing, you can toss the reward to the other side pf the wing rather than feed from your hand.>>>>
Duh. I can’t believe I even had to ask this question! Your video clearly shows you throwing the reward to the wing. I’m not sure how I missed that or why I brain farted on that! Such a simple concept that you’ve done in all your videos! HA! Sorry about that silliness. I’m still getting used to throwing a toy so bear with me as it still feels very handicapped at times! Thanks for the gentle reminder when it was clearly a no-brainer!
Thanks for all the help! It’s been so great! I’m loving the learning!
Today we dabbled with combinations. It felt like a discombobulated mess! We started with extreme connection and she did fabulous. I then did a little bit of turn aways and those too were great. So the second and third session of our training I tried combos of all sorts.
I started confusing myself so that was the initial problem. By the end Kashia was either tired, bored, cold, confused, or just uninterested. I felt like I lost a lot of enthusiasm and engagement by the end. Not making excuses but she was shivering cold earlier while I was doing chores before we practiced. Then once we got inside for the night, she didn’t want any dinner. None of this is necessarily unusual. I just mention it because it’s characteristic of her being tired and not food motivated. She was food motivated at first but she lost interest pretty quickly. No reason she should have been tired today as my husband and I worked all day…either way, it was a bit of an off day for her compared to the last several training sessions. Hopefully she’s better at the end of the week!
Having all that said, I still think she did some really good things. Some of the reps we got great “get outs” on the left. Some she still came in. She’s starting to understand the turn aways really well in this particular exercise. Putting it all together didn’t go quite as well as I would have hoped but I still think it was positive. I think it was just her lack of energy levels at the end that really threw a monkey wrench at me since her energy levels have been great otherwise. Hopefully it was mostly tiredness and maybe an overtrained brain in that moment. I took a lot of breaks and did a lot of different exercises to break it up but maybe it was still boring or over stimulating for her.
Hello!
I am pleasantly surprised that our first time trying extreme connection seemed to go pretty well! I had to implement some of your baby dog techniques which worked great. By that, I mean I kept the training sessions short. So I did about 2-3 minutes maximum with Kashia before switching to my other dog. It really helped motivate Kashia this time. She got super jealous and pouted the entire time I was working with my other dog. As soon as I let her off the tie, she was bouncing up and down and anxious to go! I was so pleased with that enthusiasm.
I rotated between dogs for 3 sessions each. Here’s my take on the sessions. I clumped all the sessions together in the video but I’m sure you’ll be able to recognize the evolution of the three as the video plays.
On the first session, I helped Kashia figure out what I wanted by going a little closer to the wing by crossing the imaginary straight line from the first wing. This seemed to really help her grasp the concept.
The second session she did super great to the right but we had some struggles to the left. I’m not really sure what I was doing wrong. I did *sorry* ignore your advice and tried for a third rep after two failure reps. She got it well enough though so I gave her lots of praise and immediately switched dogs. Switching in what seemed like the middle of this session is really what lit a fire under Kashia’s butt! She was just dancing around (for her) by the time I untied her for the third session. Besides not having great forward momentum, I’m not sure what I did wrong on the left side. I’ve watched my videos several times and I’m a bit perplexed. At any rate, tying Kashia up after that really motivated her to work *better* the third session!
On the third session, I thought she did all the “get outs” quite wonderfully for our first attempt at the lesson! I was so proud of her!
I was a little unsure how she would react to the “get out” command since I kind of use that already. When I walk my dogs at 4am on our private road unleashed, I’ll yell ‘get out’ or ‘stay out’ if they are trying to wander on my neighbor’s acreage. So she was familiar with the words and she knew they meant to move away from wherever she was but it didn’t necessarily mean move away from me. She seemed to catch on quite quickly though.
I did straight-through runs about every 2-3 reps. I did not include those in the video because I figured you didn’t need to waste time watching me run forward and Kashia follow. You have too many videos for that! LOL I also practiced some turn aways after this and she did great. I’m amazed at how strong she’s reading those cues already!
Let me know what you think! I’m anxious for your feedback whenever you get back online from your travels! Hopefully the east coast travels went smoothly! Thanks for all the help!
I’ve heard people use all those verbal cues before. Whether in the same or similar instances. I’m definitely not at that point yet with either dog, I don’t think, but maybe eventually! For now, I wont introduce a verbal. I’ll just follow the Max Pup examples.
I practiced a few short lessons since my last video. Kashia seemed to understand it a lot better this time! I also emphasized it a ton with my hands though. Either way, I was pleased with her performance so I decided this was a good one to share. Hopefully we are ready to move on to the next lesson! Of course, we will continue to practice this sporadically as to not bore Kashia but continue forward progress.
Thanks for all the help!
I knew turn aways were going to be challenging for us…but I didn’t realize just how challenging they’d be. I watched your video several times. You made them look relatively easy in positioning. But it didn’t feel that way for me. Not sure why. The mechanics aren’t overly complicated but getting that hand motion with my eyes felt hard.
I decided to do it in my house since you said speed and distance didn’t matter initially. I wanted to stay warmer. 🙂 Even going at snail speed, we struggled. Or more like I struggled.
My dogs and I have practiced a lot of front crosses in the same pattern as this sequence so it was very hard for them to go straight to perform a turn away after the first front cross. Kashia and my other dog kept wanting to do another front cross.
We had a million bloopers. I cut a bunch out that were repetitive as to not waste your time. I don’t know why this was challenging except that I’ve never really done it before. It was hard to shift my eyes from the dog to my hands. Kashia spun away from me but didn’t always make it completely around the wing. I rewarded her anyway since she still did the spin, like you said.
Was I doing something to have her pull away from me to the other side of the wing to set up for a second front cross instead of a turn away? Was it muscle memory for Kashia since we’ve done a similar exercise a lot or did I not pull her into me enough?
What can I do better? This felt very sloppy and messy.
Do you ever associate a verbal cue with a turn away or is it all just in the hands? I watched your competition track video again and I’m just amazed at how that hand motion automatically tells the dog to turn away from you. That feels like an impossible skill for us at this stage! Lol
Thanks for all the help!
P.S. I just realized my video has a lot more reps on one side than the other. I promise we didn’t practice it that one sided. I just edited out the duplicate mistakes and forgot to make it a little more balanced on each side practice. I blame my long day tiredness. 🙂
Thanks for the wonderful feedback! I’m really enjoying our conversations! And learning so much! It’s incredible!
<<<< Yes she liked it 🙂 and it must be warmer there because you didn’t have to wear 57 layers of clothing so you could run faster which she also liked 🙂>>>>>>
This made me chuckle!!!! It was about 32 degrees…that’s a heat wave compared to 0 degrees but still cold! I just got so sick of trying to practice in bulky clothes and boots that I told myself I could shed some layers and survive the cold for 15-20 minutes while I work with both dogs. I was cold by the end but it was so much more comfortable for me! Now I understand why Kashia also prefers I take off her coat for training practice. lol
<<<<<<<<<For the hard wrap stuff, you can try having her do one rep and then your other dog does one rep, so she gets an unwanted break LOL That might help keep her pumped up more.>>>>>>>>
This is a great idea…also a hard one to execute! It’s so hard to quit after just one rep! It would be as hard for me as it is for Kashia! lol She gets excited after watching my other dog so I know this trick would work great. I’ll try it out!
I guess I need to listen to Kashia more! If she does it right, then I must be doing something right too even if it doesn’t feel right. Ha ha
Up to this point, I’ve done the competition track exercises because Kashia has been doing some jumping and I figured she would handle most of it fine. However, the week 3 lesson looks incredible difficult and new to us so I think I’m going to revert back to Max Pup. I think that’s how we will be most successful. I’ve done some of the flat work you mention about having the dog circle away from me using a treat. But I’ve never applied that to anything in agility so I really don’t think she’ll understand at first. I haven’t even really taught my other dog this skill to this precision, anyway. It’s a great lesson for us. I just wanted you to know we will be going back to the foundation lessons for this one.
Thanks again for your time, wisdom, and great feedback!
I re-watched the shifting connection lesson several times this morning to try to really understand the concept now that I understand the basic steps. I definitely don’t think I did it right in my above video. I did not emphasize the landing spot with my eyes or shoulders. I just kind of made sure Kashia did the circle wrap and then took off forward. It feels like I broke connection with her at the circle wraps even though she still followed through with what I asked.
I feel so silly! I get so focused on certain things that I forget other things. Sometimes I focus more on the practical application than the actual concept. Or I focus on what I’m doing with one part of my body but I forget the other part. I look forward to the day this all becomes natural! LOL
In this video, I think I was so focused on not side stepping that I forgot to keep that connection with my inside shoulder. Unless I’m wrong, Kashia actually seemed more forgiving of my mistake than my other dog since Kashia did the wrap more successfully without pulling off of it to continue forward.
I look forward to your feedback. There’s so much to analyze every time. Just when I think I get the concept, I pick apart something else in the video! ha ha
Thank you for the feedback! We will keep working on those sends!
I tried shifting connection one more time with distance and the feedback you gave. Kashia was super energetic to start training but I could feel myself losing her throughout the exercise. I stopped several times to keep it fun. We did tricks, straight line jumping, and jumping throwing the toy. I definitely can’t practice this game again any time soon because I could feel her becoming bored. Which is really so funny because my older dog loves this exercise. She was racing around the jumps and cone like a barrel horse!
Anyway, Kashia did pretty good I think. She started wanting to only follow the toy so I had to hide it in my pocket by the end. Did I fix the cone maneuver you mentioned in your last feedback on this exercise?
<<<<<<<<<< One small detail on the circle wrap – when you were sending her around the cone, you were stepping to the side then continuing on your path behind her. See if you can use shifting connection instead of the step to the side – that will be a lot more challenging for her because there will be no motion support, and it will rely on the connection shift entirely 🙂>>>>>>>>>>
I sure tried. It’s a lot harder than it feels like it should be. I pulled my other dog with me before she got around the cone a lot. I think Kashia only did that twice. I saw a few reps where I still stepped a little but it seemed maybe a bit better. Or just less exaggerated than before. This lesson was more for me and than Kashia. I wanted to see if I could get that shifted connection at the cone.
By the last couple of reps, I really had to cheerlead Kashia along to get some speed. I immediately stopped after that and did something fun before ending. I didn’t want to push either of us too much. She still did really good though.
I look forward to new lessons this week! Thanks for the help!
I’m excited to try your feedback on the shifting connection again! I wondered if you meant 18-21 feet between jumps or between the cone and each jump. I wasn’t sure so I opted for the easier route. I’ll definitely try the bigger distance next time. She loves to run so I think she’ll like that extra distance even if it also presents challenges.
Here’s our second recording of serpentines. Kashia’s enthusiasm was great! Unfortunately, our sends were pretty not great and sloppy. I left all the bloopers in. If I’m critiquing right, I think I did a couple things wrong. I closed my shoulder from her a lot by putting my hand too far ahead of her. I forgot the magnet to nose a lot. Each time she didn’t send, I tried to remember that and fix it the next rep. It worked on most of them. Once or twice I shifted my weight back too soon and pulled her off of it. I think some of the reps I had my arm/hand way too high. It’s so hard to break the habit of wanting to point to them where to go. I understand why we don’t because it totally closes the shoulder but that just seems more natural to my brain! LOL
Even though the sends were sloppy, I still felt like the serpentines were pretty good! I was happy with her progress!
Thank you! I’m going to try the running feedback when we do serpentines again!
In order to prevent boredom, I wanted to change it up again so we went back to shifting connection. She was pretty engaged today again so I was happy for that! I put the jumps about 23ish feet apart. Maybe a little less but somewhere around there. I wanted a challenge and I wanted to give her a chance to open up her stride just a little bit. We didn’t have any issues with it! I’m sure there are things I could improve on but as for Kashia following all the commands and lines, she did really well!
I look forward to your feedback! I got a little carried away the last rep and just kept going. 🙂 I threw in some random jumps and driving forward to mix it up for her like you suggested. I think she liked that so it didn’t get too repetitive and she could just have fun running a straight line.
Thanks for all the help! I’m so impressed with Kashia’s progress so far. Your exercises and feedback have been great and are to credit for that. Thank you for helping us out so much!
Thank you! Your feedback is so encouraging! I felt it was a pretty good session especially compared to some of the bad sessions we’ve had the last two weeks. I didn’t know it was as great as you made it sound though! I guess we are improving then! I can feel it, no matter how subtle it may be, so I don’t doubt it at all. Sometimes it’s just also nice to hear from others because I don’t always see it as clearly. 🙂
I’ve re-watched my video several times and I’ve watched your video several times and I’m just now realizing I never dropped the toy at the landing spot! I suppose that may have made a difference too! I’ll try that next time! I think I sometimes forget to drop it because her drive for it isn’t super yet. In fact, in this whole session I basically just used the toy as a treat dispenser. LOL I think I only dropped it once for her. She gets annoyed trying to undo the velcro after like 3 reps so that’s why I usually just feed it out of the ball. I try to put the velcro loose so it’s easy and quick but apparently not loose enough. We are still learning it though. She seems a little more interested in the toy each time I bring it out so I’m going to keep trying!!
On the moving piece, I always get into a conundrum with myself. I want to run fast and ahead of her but I’m also trying to use sending skills to send her to the wing so I try to match her speed as well as run ahead. How do I balance that? I’m afraid if I run too far ahead, I won’t actually be sending her to the second wing because I’ll be right up at the wing waiting for her but if I don’t run, that slows her motion down too. How do I balance this better? I saw her picking up speed quite a bit more than other sessions. I was super happy with this. But I also felt myself going half way to the wing before she committed to the send which is why my motion started out slow. Once she committed to the second wing, her speed was great! I just need to figure out how to get my motion better in the beginning.
Thanks for all the help!
