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Good morning! She is doing well here overall, especially on the right turn side!
One suggestion to get her processing the verbals better:
Hold her collar longer so she hears the verbal 4 or 5 times before you let her go. You were letting her go at the same time (or just before) the verbal started, so she was reading the physical cues more than processing the verbals.
That will help on the blooper moments – she was moving before truly processing the verbal, so she needed the physical cues to help. When you were trying to get her to wrap on the 2nd side, you were using such a strong physical cue that it was pulling her off finishing the wing wrap. Then she went into wrap mode so going back to the tunnel was harder because she was tuned into physical cues and not verbals. Adding the verbals before she moves will let you fade out the physical cues.
>There’s was tugging before we started but should have also done some when I switched sides?>
Yes – definitely break it up with tugging during the side change and also, this is a great game to play entirely with a tug toy!
Nice work!
Tracy
Good morning –
He did a great job here! One of the most helpful things is that the tunnel cue and the wrap cue sound sooooooo different, it makes things easier for him to discriminate.Remember to hold his collar here so you can start the verbal before either of you start moving. That will help us build up the verbals and fade out the physical cues, plus he will know where he is going before he starts to move. For example, when he had the semi-bloopers at 1:42 & 2:19 & 2:37 where he was wrapping then realized you said tunnel… that will go away if he processes the verbal before he starts to move. He was basically wrapping then when he didn’t get a reward response he went back out to the tunnel. Clever! Ha! So definitely let him hear the verbal 4 or 5 times before letting him move.
Nice work here! Let me know how the other side goes!
Tracy
Good morning!
I agree, she is looking good! Her stay looks solid which helps so much! Yay!
I wonder if she will be even more comfy if we asked her to do this with a 5.5 or 6 foot distance? It looks like she has a little more power to give and has to hold back a bit. So you can try this with at 6 feet and let’s see what she does! If she seems like she has to stretch too much, we can try 5.5 feet.
Since her stay is looking so good, you can lead out even more so the moving target ends up being even further from jump 2 when she gets to the jump.
This is something to revisit maybe once a week – since she is just getting to the 10 month old range, time is on our side and her muscles are still developing 🙂
Great job!
Tracy
Hi! I am sure you don’t suck at blinds crosses! You either need to do them sooner (like as soon as he starts moving towards you) or be more connection (looking directly at him on the new side, with your arm out of the way so you are not blocking his view of your connection. Or both! Early timing makes it easier to show strong connection 🙂
But also yes – we will be working on rear crosses here too! We start them with this week’s prop game 🙂
Tracy
Very cool! Thanks for the info, I will definitely be spending more money than I need to spend on that stuff!
T
Hi!
Plankrobatics went great! He was quite brilliant about getting on the plank, sitting, and turning around. You can add in having him run across it, and also see if he will lie down on it then stand up (cookie lures are fine for this).
Do you have anything that is stable but can raise the plank up off the ground by another inch or two?
He was SO CUTE sitting on the wobble board while you were turning the camera on LOL! He definitely loves the wobble board- the tile of the bathroom is probably louder than the living room floor, but he was still happy to slam it around. Super! You can add in tugging here – tugging will get him shifting his weight into his rear on the wobble board, which is good practice for doing the teeter eventually.
Looking at the folding it in session:
>he would pit stop on the way to the bowl to smell my hand because I had treats in it.>
I think part of that is him learning to go past your hand so you can cue the focus on the line with an empty hand. Also, be sure that before you release him he is looking at the line/cone and not at you hand – if needed, you can move your hand a little further away so it is easier to see if he is looking at your hand or the cone.
By the end of that left turn side, though, he was doing really well going past your hand!
He was feeling very ready to wrap the cone to the bowl so he was avoiding the collar hold on the line up – you can line him up with a cookie each time so he doesn’t move away from the lineup.
>He did the first rep OK but then started skipping the cone.
He was very clever about going under the arm, though LOL!
Yes, it might have been a bit of brain-tiredness. Or a side preference thing: right turns are easy, left turns are hard. So next time start him on your right side to do the left turns and we will see what he says!
Overall, he is doing brilliantly 🙂 Great job!!
Tracy
Hi! This is quite the puppy playground!!
He took a moment to check it out at first – all of it in one place might have been visually imposing.
But then he locked into the game was was great about moving around on everything. I think the orange teeter is his favorite LOL! But really he was happy to do any of it and that is great! Wow! There must be something naturally rewarding about it because you were barely able to keep up to deliver the cookies. Good boy!
He was so funny trying to grab the toy and balance on the wobble board, you might need a longer toy 🙂The only thing that was hard to balance on was the purple-ish inflatable disc. It was a little over-inflated so he couldn’t balance on it. You can take out some of the inflation so it ends up being a little under-inflated and then I am sure he will balance on it easily.
Since he really enjoyed this, you can change configurations every couple of days to make the playground different.
>He watches all of your how to videos when I play them >
Ha! He is so adorable!!!!! Take a photo of him studying his homework LOL!
Great job :)
TracyHi!
He was totally fine with the collar grabs here and he figured out the rhythm of the game really well: come back, line up, collar touch, chase a treat. SUPER!! You can hold the collar for longer now after he lines up at your side.The line up is going great! You are using the luring correctly and he is more than happy to do this too. We will be able to fade the lures and put it on a cue very soon because he was obviously very comfy doing it! You can try fading the lure by having one hand empty and a cookie only in the hand that pulls him through your feet into position.
Great job!
Tracy
Hi!
>Rusty playing with a tug toy for 2 minutes! Who knew?>
He thought it was great fun! He was getting tired by the end and it was absolutely adorable when he was chilling out on the wobble board and holding the toy LOL!!
And I agree, the movement and noise did not bother him here (especially because he REALLY liked that toy 🙂
The size of the wobble board is great for now and by the time he is too big for it, I bet he will be old enough to bang the end of the teeter itself.
For now, you can repeat this game on a surface that is a little harder to add a little more noise to it. But be sure to use this super amazing tug toy, so the increase is noise is no big deal to him.
Great job!
Tracy
Hi!
> Things I’m doing… really working my reward markers for toy availability. >
This will definitely help in the long run!
>Offering a cookie for the drop when doing exercises. >
Yes and since he has lovely amount of toy drive, you can trade for a good cookie pretty immediately. Will we maybe lose a tiny bit of toy drive? Maybe, but that is fine for now!
>Grabbing both ends if toy for tugging. He tends to regrip a lot of I don’t. >
This is also good!
>He gets a lot of satisfaction in holding things! Of course right?! Golden.>
Yes, plus the running off and shredding can be a bit of a decompression behavior where he is self-regulating, in a very teenage way LOL!
> I went through a whole protocol of teaching return to my hand. He’s. Total rockstar with that.>
Super! You can of course use that protocol with agility-style toys.
Also, have you ever tried putting a tennis ball or small wubba in a large (or extra large) hollee roller? You can cut one of the rubber parts and shove a ball in. That is a great toy to throw as a reward and you can also use it as a moving target/tug toy by attaching it to a longer line. It is NOT a fun toy to shred though, so you can work on getting him to bring it back for a cookie or trade for one of the fuzzy toys that you hold on to. I have found that using balls like this gets retrieving going really well and it transitions nicely to the regular buggies as well!
Let me know what you think!
Tracy
Hi!
Yes, 10 months, that is definitely in the throes of adolescence and it is likely his brain is changing a LOT right now (along with his body). So breaking things down and using all sorts of different rewards will help through this sensitive period.
About the tunnel exit game: WOW! This was pretty perfect 🤩 Timing was great, your lines were great, and your connection was great! It was pretty impressive how well you could connect and run wearing a big winter coat!
I have no notes for improvement, it was great and he was flying 🙂You can keep expanding the distances and if you have a second tunnel you can put a tunnel out instead of the wing on the “go” lines!
Great job :)
Tracy
Hi!
Pillbug game:
She did a great job of following your line and more importantly… NOT jumping up or sharking even when she caught up to you. Fantastic!! That is an important element of this game and she did really well!>In the beginning I was holding the toy with both hands and switched later on to just one, which I think helped.>
Yes – holding in one hand and having it scrunched up helps because it is one less visual for her to have to sort out. Great job with our connection here!!
She did GREAT on the tunnel exit game – the first section (pre-brain-fart) was perfect!!!
The funniest part of the brain fart was Sol in a down while you were figuring it out, and totally judging you LOL!
There was a small blooper at 1:12 – You just turned too soon (your shoulder movement looked like a blind cue) but she made a good choice to grab the toy and not grab you.
At 1:21 – she got a little ahead of you on the way to the wing but then didn’t know what to do with herself so cut in then you lifted the toy when you cued the tunnel so she went to the toy. Still better than biting you! Great job breaking it down on that side with the thrown toys. You can really amplify the connection on those right turns and run all the way to the wing before turning to help her sort out the commitment.
Going to the left on the 2 wings during the last sequence was GREAT, no questions – she might be a lefty so it is easier for her to coordinate that and she doesn’t need as much support.
The Wind In Your Hair looks super strong! You were nice and early with the toy throws which helped lock her onto the jump. You can add more distance now and stick with the toy throw – you can wait one more stride before throwing to see if she will continue to the jump even when the toy is not immediately visible out ahead.
She also did great with the set point! The moving target keeps her head low and she is driving to it really well. And she was really working hard to hold the stay 🙂
What was the distance here? We want move it in a little closer to see if she will bounce the distance. She was doing a nice balanced one-stride here, so maybe shortening it up by a foot will promote the bounce. But also, she is just about 6 months old, so there is no rush on this at all! You can revisit this once every couple of weeks for now – the current distance will likely be perfect when she is closer to a year and has more of her adult body 🙂
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi!
He did well with the various collar games here! Having you take the collar before a quick toss was easy peasy. Offering the collar came along with the sit at first and he was cool with it 🙂 It did indeed look like he was starting to move his collar to your hand which is awesome!!
Moving him with the collar with the cookie magnet is great – I don’t add it in as part of the lessons at this stage because many pups are avoiding the collar hold or folks skip directly to pulling them around by the collar 😂 But he was happy with it – you can add in a combo of the cookie magnet/moving him with collar pressure then the ready-set-go of a toy or treat toss.
The rewards for stillness were great! And the middle lineup was good too – a bit of stillness can help you set up things like the hand & feet positions needed for the middle lineup.
We will be doing the head-through-loop and more leash games here soon too! Stay tuned!
Two things about this –
He had a low tail set and low/slow wag during these games (different than his norm) – might be that he feels a bit of pressure so you can intersperse these with letting him run around with a toy or having you be more upright (bending over can be pressure).
And, you can repeat all of these games after having him move more or tug a bit, so he learns it in a higher arousal state too. That will make the behavior more accessible in the higher arousal states which is when we need it for sure.
> I am struggling with the concept of holding with dog side arm and indicating with off arm and off leg. My body wants to indicate with dog side arm and leg. >
Yes, I agree that this stage is *awkward* because I also use my dog-side arm to cue focus forward when doing it for real. Since we don’t want to bring a stay into this yet, the options are to either hold with the dog-side arm point with the opposite arm, or to hold with the opposite arm and point with the dog-side arm. My arms are not long enough to hold with the opposite arm so I use the dog-side arm. And it has been a super easy transition to pointing with the dog-side arm when the sit comes into this 🙂
>Also struggling because he’s offering the cone wrap and I like that and I keep forgetting it’s not about that, it’s about the SSC. >
It is about all-of-the-above! It is mainly about multi-sensory integration and teaching his brain/carve out neural pathways that prioritize looking at and going to the cone wrap over anything else.
>The session today I ended up reinforcing and then naming and then standing to show the 2 wraps and forgot it was about passing the treat bowl or toy, not getting the actual behavior. >
Still sounds like a good session, though – and will make the SSC control element even easier because the wrap behavior is even more strongly encoded. Let me know how adding the SSC element goes!
Very nice toy switches and retrieving in the video here! He is definitely a lefty and we will keep that in mind as the games get more complex. He seems to really gravitate towards physical contact and hugs which makes the retrieve a lot easier. You are also doing a great job of NOT making it about taking the ball away, because that is where retrieves disappear 🙂
Great job :)
Tracy
Hi!
I am so glad he had fun in scent work class! I am not surprised to hear he did great – you’ve prepared him well 🙂Those are really cool pods!! Much better than the prickly things we have here. He was brilliant about getting right up on them and I loved the deliberate foot placement at the end!!! He figured out that it was better to carefully place each foot because knocking the pods over would not lead to more rewards. And click/treat to you for breaking it up with toy play. Really excellent session here!
Do you have 2 more pods? You can try to get one foot on each!
Tracy
