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Good morning! This went really well!
You were able to exit a lot of handling moves and he is reading them really well!! And your connection is looking strong for most of it, which really helps support his line.
Two ideas for you, as the sequences get more and more complex:
One thing to add is having the verbals come sooner for the tunnel exits – try to have all of the verbals happen before he enters the tunnel so he knows to do when he exits. That will tighten up the turns and all prevent off courses when he has not been told what to do:
For example at :28 he entered the tunnel and saw you accelerating, so he went straight on the exit. You were quiet and not connected on the exit, so he stayed on his line – that is correct.
At 1:51 you gave your ‘right’ verbal before he entered the tunnel and he had a great turn on the exit!
Another thing to add is *not* stopping to fix anything that goes wrong – you have reached the stage of handling where things are complex and the dogs are relying on our handling for all the info… and when we humans are wrong, they are still correct. Stopping to fix something can be frustrating to the dogs because they read us correctly and are wondering why they are being told they were wrong (by stopping).
Going back to the run at :28 when he went straight after the tunnel – when you stopped to fix it, he got mad (jumped on you) and then there were several failures in a row
You will see that any blooper on the video here was handler induced for example:
:47 you said out but turned away and that pulled him off the line you wanted (he was correct there too) and he jumped up on you when you stopped. Compare to 1:20 where you took a few more steps along the line and he got it easily.
At 2:05 your upper body was pulling him in but your motion was pushing him out to the wing, so since there was a conflicting indicator he went with motion (which is correct to do when there is confusion)
So, don’t stop and fix anything – keep going to the next obstacle and then reward. Then you can stop and figure out how to be clearer with the cues and get it in flow… and he won’t be mad or frustrated 🙂
A good example of continuing was at 1:10 where you said out and stepped into his line, which sent him off course to what sounds like a tunnel not visible on the video. You chuckled and kept going, and he did not get frustrated at all! That was perfect.
Nice work here! Enjoy June and see you soon!
TracyGood morning!
No Es on a weekend of Ashley Deacon courses? That’s impressive! Congrats!!!!!!
The backside work on the video looks really great. I think you had the perfect arm position and connection – he went directly to the backside and didn’t look at you for more info. Yay!! And you were able to get pretty far from the entry wing too!
To solidify his understanding of taking the jump after arriving at the backside and get more countermotion, I think the best plan is to always throw the toy and not deliver it from your hand. He’s watching your hands, so we can shift where he looks by using an exaggerated and early toy throw:
As he gets to the entry wing, throw the toy far past the jump and a little closer to the entry wing (nowhere near you 😀 ) Throwing it far and not close to you will get him to turn to the bar and jump it a little long, so he doesn’t hit the bar or wing. He will still have a tight turn and line when we aren’t Throwing the toy, but this placement will really emphasize looking for the bar and not at you 😀Nice work here!!
TracyI have total faith that you’ll use the right verbals, thanks to brainwashing yourself by doing running walk throughs 🙂
T
Good morning!
I think this sessions falls into the ‘on the right track’ category. Yes, there is definite processing and some “is it this answer” rather than the verbals being fluent yet. But she had a high rate of success with a bit of failure mixed in, and that builds the skill in the right direction. This is a game to revisit and you will see her get exponentially better and better – plus, as the soft turn verbals going into course work, you will see her have those “aha!” moments of responding to them in context.I really only have one suggestion for the next session:
You can add a light collar or harness so it is easier to hold her. Hand-on-chest works in a lot of ways and different games for her, but in this game it was causing her to lean away/move away – and this game relies on the precision of lineup. And if she was having ‘the ick’ about being held, she was not really devoting as much bandwidth to verbal processing.
And since she was not as close to you, she was also looking away more (instead of at which line you wanted her to take) which made it harder. Both whippets and BCs will look away like she was doing when they have the ick about something, so I don’t know which breed to blame here hahahaha but I think it was more looking away because of the hold and not as much head swiveling to guess the direction.
You did move her into position and hold her slightly differently later in the session, but I am not sure she loved it as much as she tolerated it, and might have been thinking about it a bit much when we want thinking about verbals. So something as simple as a light collar can take all of her questions out about the starting position.
>Then there was the one naughty one where she went to chase my other dog (not the old black dog she’s a bit afraid of, but the one that is her best bud) who left the bed he was supposed to be waiting on to be closer to the action.>
The “no ma’am” moment was hilarious and I love how she came back like “I TOTALLY ROCKED THAT” LOL!!
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning! I am glad you had fun at the Classic – Ashley Deacon can be counted on for fun courses!
>Got back to the baby level backside slice. Started with the exit.>
I think that went well overall – he thinks the countermotion is hard 🙂 and wants to look at you. The toy throws helped here at the beginning and also the toy throws helped when you were rewarding throughout the video… but he still was not lokoing at the bar without the toy throw. So for the next session, add a placed reward on the landing side, even if it is an empty food bowl to drop treats into so he looks at you less when we want him looking for the bar. That will add some challenge getting to the backside, but that is fine 🙂
> Tried to get further across the bar than yesterday which was hard for him. Ended up practically at the wing to help him, then gradually moved back closer to the middle and tried a little bit of moving toward the exit. >
I think two things were happening that caused him to question if it was the front or back (he was looking at you to figure it out):
– he is going faster, so I think you can go faster too. The motion will help support the line to the backside better. If you stay a little closer to the start wing til he is just about exiting, then jog/slow run up the line, he will feel more support from the motion.
– more importantly, I think you were connecting so much (which is good) that your dog-side arm was waaaayyyyyy back… so it looked like a threadle arm and was pulling him in to the front. You can see him checking in with you: “Are you sure, human?” LOL!
You can keep the connection but relax the arm a bit so you don’t have it back as far and there is less rotation at the waist, and then it won’t look like a threadle arm. To help stay connected without pulling the arm too far back, you can point your fingers to his nose which will prevent the arm from pulling way back. I use the outside arm here especially in the learning stages to get the connection/shoulder position without accidentally threadling.
For example. you can see how far back your dog-side arm is at :48, so he comes in to the front.
Compare to 1:10 where you relaxed it forward a bit so your fingers track with his nose and that totally helped him find the backside line – it was the ‘just right’ combo of connection and arm cue and motion.
Nice work here! See you very soon!!!!
Tracy
Good morning!
I don’t think his brain was broken LOL!! He just doesn’t know the verbal that independently yet, and the physical cue needs to match it for now. He was being a good boy!
> I tried to parallel his line and really push him to the back and he could (only) get it when I did that,>
Yes – the best instance of that was at :04, where you only nedeed a couple of steps up the parallel line to get him on the line ot the backside. That was the exact line, and you had really good connection too as he was exiting the cone – and then we keep moving you over further and further, so you don’t need to be as close to the entry wing.
So for now, keep the parallel line going to where the wing and the bar meet on the entry side. Then when he can do that, you can move over and try to get the parallel line to th center of the bar – then eventually it becomes a parallel line to where the wing and bar meet on the exit side. That will feel really independent!
On the reps where he took the front, he had to choose the verbal versus the body cue which was turned to the front, so as with most young dogs, he went with the physical cue.
>but in reality I know I will likely not always (mostly never) be there to do that so I’d like it to be a little more independent so I don’t have to be there to shape his line.>
When he was on your right like at :04, you didn’t really have to shape the line and, by moving your line over bit by bit, it will be easier to get the backside. I agree that when he was on your left at :20, :24, :28 you had to step into his line a bit more but I think that was because as he was exiting the cone, you were turning away (running in a curve) rather than moving parallel to his line, so then you had to step back to the line.
When I was accidentally curving instead of moving parallel, I would put a leash on the ground to remind me to run parallel to the path I wanted, and that made a big difference! With a line on the ground, you can move forward on the parallel line, and use your arm pointing to him and not ahead of him – both of those will help him stay out for the backside more independently too.
Nice work here!
Tracy
Hi!
She did great here with the layering! She has to take a lot more strides to get out on the line than a bigger dog, making it a harder skill.
>success seemed to depend on where wing no.1>
Ye – and also how much momentum she has heading to the wing.
At :24, she took the tunnel instead of the jump, and that is a spot where I think there needs to be more momentum and acceleration into the wing wrap. So you can start her further away and really run into it so she is running in extension a she gets to the wing.Also it will help to use obstacle names now, instead of “go”. The reason for this is because “go” often applies to the tunnel as well, so the ‘go’ verbal might lock her onto the tunnel. This is a good opportunity to work the difference between the tunnel and jump verbals, which can really help her with layering too.
Good job rewarding all the stays!! I think she is a little unsure of the release – she might think it relates to when you re-connect with her. So be sure to lead out, connect, take a breath… then release her separately from the re-connection or any arm movement.
The stay made the FC to the tunnel very easy, and she had a nice layering rep at the end too!
Great job!
TracyGood morning!
> It is hard for me to understand pushing on his line, when I feel like I am so far away. >
He reads the line of your motion and follows it really well. When you were pushing on his line, you were moving a bit sideways towards the wing. When he was successful, you were moving forward on a straighter line, parallel to the line he would have to take. Very subtle for sure! If you play in slow motion, it is easier to see.
>If the rain ever stops I will try again while connecting better and thinking about my position.>
At this point, I am not sure if the rain will ever stop LOL!!!
> I am very interested in some of your brain camp videos, will they be available to purchase later?>
Yes, they are all available at any time. If any say registration is closed, let me know and we will get you in 🙂
> I have to pay my Real Estate Tax, and you know VA likes to tax!>
Yep – my tax bills are sitting in envelopes right next to me right now, to be dropped off today. My county LOVES to tax all the things!! Sigh.
Tracy
Hi! It sounds like the UKI thing was very fun!! Bummer about the rain though.
The reps here were really good! The angle of the jump was very slight so he was truly going to a backside. You were heading to the center of the bar by the last rep, so you can add in moving even further over to be able to add the German turn exits as well in the next session. And you can run more as long as you stay connected and on the parallel path.
Nice work! Fingers crossed for nice weather ahead!
Tracy
Hi! It is definitely a tricky drill!
This went well at the beginning, no problem at all getting the turn aways on the wing past the tunnel! Overall, you can connect more by looking at him and using a little less high arm especially as he exits the tunnel. When he needs more connection, you can see him looking at you to double check the info. Or he misses an obstacle, like the tunnel at 2:05.
On the part where he was either going to the wrong side of the wing on the other side of the tunnel or back into the tunnel: that was just as bit of motion and timing that needed adjustment.
When he went to the other side of the wing at :44 & :57 & 1:32 – what happened there was that you pushed in sideways to his line. He was coming to the correct side of the wing and then your motion pushed him back out – he even looked at you to double check before moving back out, good boy! Be sure to reward if you stop, or keep going then reward like you did at 1:02 (that was great!)
On the reps at :52 and 1:49 – you were moving on a much better line but then you were too late turning him back out to the wing, so he took the tunnel.
When it went well, like at 1:16 – you turned parallel to the line you wanted and moved forward on it, and turned him back out to the wing before he got past you or locked onto the tunnel. Nice!!
So when you tackle these again, ramp up your eye contact with him, and be careful not to push into his line on the turn aways, and it will all be smooooth and fast!
Great job!
TracyGood morning!
>Sorry I’m having trouble posting on our original thread. I keep getting this error message – A problem repeatedly occurred on “https://agility-
u.com/forums/topic/laura-rose-and-zest/”.>Sorry it is being a pain! Starting a new thread is great. For tech problem solving… what device do you use? We have seen this before when iPhones/iPads feel the threads are too big and there has been a recent iOs update. Apple products don’t always love to talk to other platforms and then it smooths out as they work out the kinks in the new updates and also as the platforms we use here catch up to the Apple updates. Let me know and I will pass it along to tech.
Back to the video! Nice session here!
The serps went well – it looks like you were closer to the jump and he had no questions. I was going to suggest getting ahead of him but then you started doing it! Super!
On the first attempt at being ahead at :17 you were ahead AND faster so he did not serp and you gave good feedback of “that was not it, sir” 🙂 Then you were ahead and NOT as fast at :20 and he got it… then you were ahead and REALLY fast at :23 and he was perfect. YAY!
For the backsides: as he is solidifying the verbal, adding a parallel path of motion forward to the backside before moving along the serp line will help a lot. What I mean by that is as he is exiting the wrap wing, you are moving forward towards the entry wing of the backside for a couple of steps to set the line then as you see him heading towards the backside, you then turn and move through the serp line.
On the reps where he took the front of the jump and not the back (like at ):30 you wwere already turned to the serp line as he exited the wing, so he took the front as he was following the line of your motion & shoulders.
Compare to :40-:41 and :52 where you moved parallel to his line to the backside as he exited the wing wrap for a couple of steps before turning to the serp and he got it nicely there. You can also see that parallel line of motion for a few steps very clearly at :48! So definitely keep adding the parallel line of motion to cue the backside. And you can also very slightly angle the jump towards him as he exits the wing, so it is easy to see the back and harder to get to the front 🙂
Side note: he did REALLY well when you told him he was incorrect and to try again. I didn’t see him doing any change in arousal – he just said ok and tried again (unless you edited out any madness haha!) That is great that he was resilient to being told “nope not it” a couple of times and he didn’t change arousal state. You were also really good about not allowing too much failure, and helping him when he had a question by adjusting the handling.
Great job!!
TracyGood morning!
>Ok good, we have one more week of you reassuring me when I feel like I’m just a terrible dog trainer lol>
Ha! You are a great dog trainer, look how amazing she is already!!
Even when class is over, send me FB messages any time you need reminders that you are doing great 🙂 I think you probably need more of the Surviving Adolescence support because the training skills are totally where they should be.
>Because we had that one good session from my last post and then yesterday it felt like maybe we haven’t learned anything the past 6-7 months.>
I think you are seeing the joys of adolescent brain development (the ‘joys’ is sarcastic, of course LOL!) They know something one day… and the next they do not especially if there is a context change. And their brains are more on alert for those environmental changes (has to do with the evolutionary development making them more independent at this age, which means they are more alert to environmental changes in order to survive independently because the amygdala is driving the bus and the pre-frontal cortex is not developed enough yet to make good executive decisions). The weaves next to the tunnel was a HUGE context change for her developing brain so she couldn’t quite do the tunnel at speed and while ignoring the weaves. I think you did a great job of breaking it down for her and not allowing too much failure, and not showing outward frustration.
By the end of the video, she was absolutely fabulous with the skills you wanted to work on so the session was a win in 2 ways:
-a bit of work on the skills you wanted to play with, and those went really well
-a lot of generalization exposure to help her find the tunnel even with something different/weird right there (also went really well!)Turns out after working the generalization, she was able to produce the skills for the starfish game PERFECTLY.
> wound up feeling pretty frustrated that it took so much work and we spent very little time on the main focus of the session. Two steps forward, one step back I guess.>
Yeah, in the moment it was probably annoying AF to have to reset the plans for the session… but also very typical of life with adolescent dogs LOL!! I see it is only steps forward here, no steps back, because you had to teach her an important generalization/discrimination skill even though it was not part of the original plan. And you were really terrific in how you broke it down and helped her out – that was the best part of the session even though you were probably annoyed inside your head LOL!! And after working the generalization/discrimination skill, it turned out you didn’t need to work hard at all to get the handling stuff going because that all looked lovely 🙂
Nice work here 🙂
Tracy
Good morning!
>Ok, I did it! A whole handling session and I used all the right verbals! Super simple, just the smiley face with either wrapping or doing the race track around. >
Yay! That is great! It is a useful habit because it will rewire your brain to the point where the correct verbals are automatic. I was originally motivated to do this because I was getting so annoyed at myself for messing up the words LOL!!! But it is great for learning and also made for far better runs with the dogs, even with puppy exercises.
I do this with my adult dogs too, working up to full courses – mainly because I don’t get a chance to work them in classes at all and rarely in seminars, so I need to be able to really ‘know’ them in order to trial successfully – I run the walk throughs and video tape it, then run the dog and overlay the first run (with the dog) with the last walk through. Incredibly insightful about what we humans are doing on course, before we do it on course 🙂 Helps with timing, connection, etc.
>I DID run/walk each of the 4 sequences that I ran with full verbals, including the correct intended reward marker, while she was still in the house (after I mowed the yard and set up the obstacles). I wasn’t sure walk/running all 4 sequences, then running all 4 would be as effective as walking each one then running it, then walking another etc but in this case it worked. >
It is fantastic practice for when you are at a bigger UKI event, for example, and have to walk multiple courses before running any of them.
>I’ll need to come up with something (ex pen and just listen to her be mad?) while I walk-run for those times I don’t have to go out and mow the lawn first? Pretty sure if I just left her in the house and went out there she would still yell about it. I can put her in the car (it’s where I put the non-working dogs while I am out in the yard with the others) but it’s very far from the agility yard.>
I often put the ‘working’ dog in the car, or leave them in the house – that is all good for my brain because I have to retain the walk through for a little longer, just like at a trial. And it gives me some time to connect with the dog before running the sequence (physical and mental warm up).
On the video: Fantastic session! The most interesting thing to me here was that you were SUPER connected and appeared not to rush at all… even with Beat going fast fast FAST!!! 99% of it was spot on perfect in terms of physical cues and verbal cues. She really had no questions when you did that, and was able to go really fast (wowza!) and also turn really tight 🙂
There was one small blooper at :54 – As she was passing you to the wing, your head was turned looking at the next line and that was too much countermotion for her, for now. I think as she gets more experienced, it will be perfectly fine to turn your head that early.
For now, she needed a little more connection support, meaning your eyes following her as she passes you and heads to the wing. That is what you did on the next rep (last rep) and she was perfect. Looking at the ‘landing spot’ (or where landing would be on when using a wing only) really supports the commitment.
I grabbed screenshots so you can see the difference:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1K6o3_slzmShlrWicu_CaXLWAgW_Wm-MyxBHH_KbCUNs/edit?usp=sharing
The tunnel-wrap session also went really well! You followed the mantra of “help as much as needed but as little as possible” and she did great!
She is so funny, almost saying “I GOT IT” when she I convinced she has processed the verbal correctly – she was standing still for the first moment or two of the verbal and then would tense her muscles as if asking for you to let her go. Kind of like hitting the buzzer on a game show: I know the answer!
When she was not a sure (like the first ski after the tunnel at 1:34) – we did not see any I GOT IT body language. But on the next rep at 1:52 and on the next rep, watch her hind end: LET ME GO, I GOT IT lol. You can see it on the tunnel reps too.
So that might be good & helpful feedback from her: if you don’t see or feel that moment of muscle tension, she might be guessing 🙂 So keep repeating the cue til she gives you the I GOT IT moment, then let her move.
You can add the other side and also the advanced level of tunnel then wrap all in one rep, and then tunnel then tunnel then wrap all in one rep too 🙂
>turning left and ski and tunnel are more different than tight and tunnel>
You can make them sound different: for the wraps, say the verbal quietly and fast, emphasizing the “t” sound: TiTiTiTiTight. For the tunnel verbal, extend it and yell it 🙂 emphasizing the UH in tunnel: TUUUHNNEL TUUUHNEL etc. That will sound very very different and I bet she does great.
>So overall I was happy with both of these sessions.>
Absolutely – really great stuff here! And also, just enough failure to be informational for humans and dog 🙂 I think there was one error in each session, which is basically what we want. SUPER!
>Sunday 5/25 is the last day of submissions? >
June 3rd! Have fun!
Tracy
Good morning!
I think he did really well with these distances! His bounces looked powerful and when he needed to add a stride, he did really well with that too!My only suggestion is to have the reward on the ground rather than thrown from your hand: that will keep him looking low and forward (he was starting to lift his head between jumps 2 and 3 looking up at you). So if you have the toy attached to a long one or long toy then use it as a moving target, you can help him keep his head low and get even more power.
For the distances between jumps 2 and 3: you can start to increase them more. For example, the next session can be something along the lines of 8 feet then 12 feet then 16 feet then 12 feet then 8 feet between jumps 2 and 3. Let me know how he does with that!
Great job!
Tracy
Good morning!
Really nice session here! This game is challenging and you & Beat had lovely runs!!
>I think this is just another example of me having too many words/cues and not keeping them straight. I even walked/talked it out before I ran it and still didn’t realize it was the wrong word.>
Two thoughts for you here:
For your walk through, the best way to be able to get the verbals during the run, is to run during the walk through (nerd moment: state-dependent memory). If you are in one state (walking) during encoding and a different state (running) during recall, it is harder to recall the verbals. But if you are in the same state (running and running), it is soooo much easier. In the learning stages of verbals (human learning LOL) I always have people run their walk throughs and it makes things a lot easier.
>she skips the jump wing and goes for the tunnel on one start line and one other time on that jump in sequence>
Both of those were conflicting indicators (handling versus verbal) where the handling info overrode the verbal (and the verbal was not salient enough to really help). They were at:
:29 where was in a stay, there was not enough support from the physical cues there (conflicting indicator – verbal said one thing, body said something else) – you said one quiet verbal cue then immediately turned your body away without any physical indication to the wing. The physical indication said “tunnel” and that overrode the one quiet verbal.
You have now entered the stage of her training where all of this is rewardable because there is a 99% chance she was correct. So better to just reward her as you set up for the next rep, than to withhold reward which can be frustrating – you can see it on her face where she was like “but I did it right…” The cookie for the sit came about 9 seconds later so it did not correlate to the handling.
Compare to :44 where you cued her to look at the wing before the release then stepped to it, so she went to it beautifully.
The other spot was at 1:11 – she didn’t go to the wing at 1:11 because your physical cues/connection turned away from the line: you turned towards the tunnel. Yes, there was a high arm out in the direction of the wing but all of the other cues said tunnel. There was only one hup cue versus a ton of physical input.
Compare to the very last rep where your physical cue was sooo much clearer and connected to her. It is a hard line and she got it because you cued it clearly.
So the verbals for now do need to be supported with physical cues, it takes a long long time for verbals to be so independent that our bodies can say something different and they cue off of one verbal cue.
There was a whole lot of really nice work here:
Nice timing of starting the cues before she went into the tunnel, that really helped you get the tandems after the tunnel. Big Click/Treat for you!!!
The sequence :57 – 1:11 was GREAT! Same with the sequence 1:20-1:27, look at the distance you are getting on the tandem! That is going to help with the threadle wraps!
Those moments all had verbals and physical cues working together, and looked fantastic!
>And one other tendency I’ve noticed coming on with her that I’ve noticed with many of my previous dogs (so clearly it’s something that I’m training into them) was her looking around on the start and winding up fixated on that bird outside the fence on that last rep. It seems to be a thing that I ask dog to sit, start to lead out and they just start looking around until I come to a stop and then they pay attention again (or get distracted by BIRD!) Something I’m doing to cause this?>
Interesting observation! Yes, we all train the same things into our dogs LOL!! My guess is that you can be more unpredictable on the start line & lead outs. You might be too predictable, meaning the rhythm is always the same: lead out, take a while, release. So if you vary that, they will watch you more. Sometimes release immediately! Sometimes run to the lead out position. Sometimes throw a reward back as lead out. Change the timing of the release and reward, plus change the connection (sometimes looking at them, or being goofy as you walk away or saying “ready ready”). The surprise factor will be very motivating to all of them, to help them watch you the whole time 🙂
Great job here!
Tracy
