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Hi!
Strike a pose is going well in both directions! Super!!
She was picking up on the little chain we want here: in (hit the target) to out (head to reward). The video cut off your head, so be sure to look at the target if you were not already doing so. When we look at the pups, they are more likely to go to the cookie hand and not the target, so looking at the target supports the line to it. it is possible that on the couple of reps where she went to the cookie hand, you were looking at her (or you might have been looking at the target and she just went to the cookies LOL!)
The cookies were pretty visible here – so the next step is to repeat the session with a toy instead of cookies. If that goes well, you can get the toy to the ground – I like to use a really long toy so it can start scrunched up in my hand, then I can gradually increase its length til one end is on the ground and I am holding the other end. And you can also replace the visible cookie hand with a food bowl or Manners Minder on the ground. All of this will prepare her for the concept transfer to a jump 🙂
>Oh, the “it’s so terrible to be you” comment is towards my other dog whining ever so quietly and pathetically in a crate!)>
Ha! So sad to be the dog that has to watch LOL!!
Great job here!
Tracy>Do you think the change in her behavior could have just been how reinforcing “get it” (chase the moving cookie) is compared to “yes” (take a cookie from my hand with maybe a sore mouth)? That she slowed down upon hearing “yes” anticipating coming to my hand?>
That is quite possible – moving is more exciting than slowing down. But also, based on what was almost a startle response, it is possible that it was simply unexpected. Not better than the ‘yes’ marker, just more surprising in that moment. And that means there is a stronger likelihood of a dopamine spike because it is those happy surprises that create it 🙂 And that can be what makes it more reinforcing. The “yes” marker is great for rehearsal and different types of learning & memory, even if it is less reinforcing (in terms of dopamine) in that moment.
>I guess what I worry about with all these marker cues is that I put all the effort into teaching them and learning them myself, only to use them correctly only 70% of the time in training sessions (while also training with worse physical mechanics because I’m trying to remember words), maybe 50% of the time in real life situations and any one else who interacts with her is likely to use them correctly 0% of the time. Do they still have as much value as general marker cues if the dog can’t actually predict anything based on them any way?>
This is such an important point! It is also why I personally don’t have a zillion different markers… no one remembers them all (the best kept secret in dog training is that they get screwed up at the rates you mentioned or even more often LOL) then we get distracted from good mechanics when we realize we are screwing up the verbals.
I think it is important to have a handful of really powerful markers that roll of the tongue: my most important training markers are ‘get it’, ‘catch’ and ‘bite’. They are meaningful to the dogs, and I don’t screw them up 🙂 There are other markers that I have used, but I am more likely to forget them and so they are not nearly as predictive… and therefore not nearly as useful or valuable. Good mechanics are far more valuable.
And we can also depend on the dogs’ brilliance at reading context. I believe that great mechanics are sooooo important! And for the other things, like placement? Context, good mechanics, and the handful of powerful markers all come together quite nicely.
Tracy
Hi!
The baby level of the lap and tandems looked really strong, it is cool to see how well he turns in both directions.One suggestion as you move forward with the lap turns: Have your lap turn hand visible to him sooner and lower (nose level). You were holding it up high until he almost gets to you here, which works in the smaller area here but that will be harder to draw him in when we add the obstacle (prop :)) or more speed. So when he turns towards you, he should see the lap turn hand extended towards his nose, elbow locked, until he is a few inches from it.
The Tandems went well too! You can try this with him a little behind you (rather than parallel) so that you are showing the cues sooner.
Both of these can be “looped” meaning that as he gets the reward for the previous rep, you can be setting up the cue for the next rep with no break in between. That builds in some speed and quickness of mechanics for you both! Do a few in a row then break off for tugging.
I think he is ready for the advanced level on both of these, adding the prop to go past as he drives to the hand cues.
> The first couple of reps he went right to the toy – not following the BC, but he improved with each rep. Toy distraction is hard and that’s the lunchtime play chase toy, so while he did play chase (and he got some tosses, tug and chase between reps), I changed up the picture on him.
Did you take those out? He didn’t really change sides on the last 2 reps, but that was because you didn’t really establish connection on the left side (original side) before doing the blind, so like any smart Mali he anticipated and went to where he knew you were going next 🙂 Those reps towards the end were a little wider, possibility a harder side and possibly in anticipation of the toy throw?
The first reps on the video were tighter! And you can give more connection back to him as you do the blind: note how at :53, for example, he is slightly delayed finding the new side – you were connecting to your hand more than connecting back to him, which closed your shoulders and made it harder to read the blind.
That is what might have been happening when he didn’t read the side change at all – it is possible that the conenction was not clear enough.
Of course it is possible that he was very locked onto the toy 🙂
Or both!
So if you have video of him not changing sides, let me see it so we can figure out why, and plan 🙂
He definitely liked the toy! And it is easy to roll it for him to chase. The only thing to add there is, after the pivot and when you throw it, you also run (toy races!) and use your go go go verbal. The toy throw is meant to help cue the Go line along with your acceleration.
Great job here!
TracyHi!
> I thought here Tracy enjoy yet another video of my big butt as I play with my dog 🤣>
HA!!! I don’t even notice butts on the video, only dogs – except my own butt when playing with the dogs LOL!
>I know this course is not about this but taq so schools me in connection;)>
Every course is about connection 🙂 Without it, our youngsters don’t lock onto lines (and it really helps our adult dogs too!)
The sequence on the first video looked really strong! Your connection was REALLY visible and she locked onto those lines pretty independently. And she had strong jumping form and forward focus!! And you had nice timing of your verbals too, happening at takeoff of the previous jump. You can add a teeter verbal right before she enters the tunnel (then again when she exits it) so she looks for it more.
I think the teeter surprised her and you were passing it pretty far ahead of her on the first rep so she didn’t ‘see’ it til it was too late to get on it. And your connection was a little softer in that spot too. That is good to know for when teeters go into the trial rins – get closer and support it like you did on the 2nd run. You won’t have to do that forever, because she will not be surprised by the teeter in the sequence.
> She comes further down the teeter if she is on my left side. Always not just in this video. The dog is so very sided!!!>
Interesting! The teeter on your left was GREAT on the 2nd video (very international style :)). That might be a contributing factor to why she missed it on the first rep here (it was on your right side). So for her first trials with the teeter – set it up so she runs it on your left side, to make it easier. And in practice, work the end games of the teeter more (bang game, for example) on your right side so you both get more comfy with it.
Have a fabulous time at the Invitational! We will be cheering for you!!
Tracy
Lori is a great judge!
And I haven’t forgotten to get the freeze dance game on video – I had to deal with getting the RV to a service center which was quite an adventure. I will get that video done asap!
Hi!
The parallel path is going well!! She definitely has good value for the prop! You can replace the click with your ‘get it’ marker. And I see what you mean by doing it in the garden being hard because she can’t find the treats. Do you have a long narrow hallway you can use? I think when it is easier for her to see the treats, you can add the rear crosses: throw the treats REALLY far (as far as possible, 3 or 4 meters) and go all the way to it with her. Then after she eats it, turn and move forward again. If there is a LOT of room, she will move ahead of you and you can start the rear crosses.
Also, a new rear cross game (no prop needed :)) was posted today, so you can start that too to get the rear crosses going.
On the indoor parallel path game, she was moving ahead of you as long as you didn’t start moving until after she finished chewing (chewing was delaying her movement to the prop LOL!)
The sideways sending also went better after she finished chewing and you had some countermotion added too! When extending your arm to the prop, leave it extended until after she is moving to the prop. When you did that, she got it right every time. When you pointed to the prop and drew your arm back very quickly, she looked at your hand and didn’t go to the prop. So you can even leave it extended towards the prop as you begin moving away with the countermotion – the arm can help support commitment for now.
Great job here!!!
TracyGood morning!!
Congrats on an awesome weekend!!!
> No video of any of this but really it would just be to show off my cutie puppy so it’s ok 😉>
All cute puppy show off videos are welcomed here!!!!
> but my brain was like “hold still until he touches the mat and then move”… so, work in progress on the moving away aspect lol.>
Yes, this is the hard part for us humans! You can start by learning the other direction which will help convince your brain to move the other direction 🙂
The first couple of reps were ‘normal sends’ but the rep at :43 was a true countermotion – yay!!! You can keep working on the reps to make it look like that!
The parallel path game is off to a good start! To get him moving more independently across it so you can add more distance, use your ‘get it’ marker for the thrown reward so when he hits the prop, you can mark and toss the reward straight ahead (rather than get it on/near the prop). This might require more visible treats when working in the grass, so maybe bits of cheese would work best?
Looking at the barrel wraps:
>You’ll see his right turns/from my left were a struggle, I am not sure if it’s something I’m doing or he just doesn’t quite get it or hard to look away or simply the harder side? (No food in my cueing hand) Left turns/from my right were easier. I don’t think you can see where the leash is on the ground>
It is possible that he was just a lefty that day and not a righty 🙂 This happens a lot – we start the game on one side, but it is the harder side and they just.can’t.do.it. So if that happensm you can switch and try from the other side.
Good job letting him offer the wrap at the beginning on those right turns and then when you stepped forward into the right turn a bit more at :36, that helped too. But he really was saying “I cannot turn right today”. He even offered going to the left turn side of the barrel at one point (:35). Then when you switched sides so he could turn left? Smooth as silk!
It is absolutely cool to work this skill on the easier side first to get it going (then switch to the harder side in the next session). And if you start on what you think the easier turn side is and he says “nope, not today” then you can totally switch sides 🙂 It is totally normal that a puppy would have a side preference and also totally normal that it shifts around or is unpredictable – all part of the brain development 🙂 So we go with whatever the brain needs that day, and gradually add in the harder side.
So for the next session, start with him on your right (left turns) and see if he is a lefty that day 🙂
Then after a few reps, you can switch to him on your left (right turns). If he still says “CAN’T!” then one other thing that can jump start the harder turn side is to put the empty bowl out there. The visual target can help his brain remember how to turn to the right 🙂>We only have a couple more days before the next rain storm moves in, so going to try to play outside every day- we both loving having more space!!!>
Bummer about the rain but hooray for outdoors!!! Keep me posted!!!
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi! This video is the same as the previous one – let me know if you wanted to post a different one.
Tracy
Good morning!
> I enjoy watching him when the light goes on.>
Me too! He was fabulous!!! Terriers in general are hilarious when they are solving problems. They are like I GOT THIS!!!!!! Adorable and brilliant! That is exactly what he did here – took a quick moment at the beginning to sort it out. Then he nailed it!
He had another moment in the middle from :28 – :34 where he lost the flow. That was because you had a couple of treats spill out, you picked them up, then watch your right hand: you moved it out to the other bowl and held it there. He saw that as he lifted his head from the bowl he was getting the cookies from – and followed your right hand as if it was a cue to go there. It was enough of a visual distraction to catch his attention. But then he figured it out and got right back in the flow. It was a good resilience moment – a small conflicting indicator (your hand said ‘don’t wrap!’ but the game said “DO wrap!”) and he solved the puzzle without frustration. Love it!!
He was fast and happy here, so you can move to the next steps:
Change your position to doing this with you in a chair. And then standing. If he is fine with you in the chair, you can probably move to the standing position in the same session. If not, spread it out over a couple of sessions.You can also add a large cone or barrel for him to go around, which will be perfect for moving into the turn and burn game when you are standing.
Great job!!!
TracyGood morning!
>Poor kid has a loose tooth bothering her. All her other teeth so far fell out without seeming to cause an issue, but one canine is hanging on while the adult one is coming in and that one seems sore. In this session I was trying to warm her up with toy play and she stopped abruptly and was licking the left side of her face. I spent a minute or so (edited out) verifying it was a tooth, then returned to gentle play since she seemed to want to, ready to abort and just go to food if needed.>
Poor girl! Ouch!! Yes, all of this can be done with food but also yes – she did well with the toy.
> I’ve worked a little bit on some fitness stuff with the food container open and next to me on the floor (all with me sitting and readily able to cover it), and that blew her mind for several sessions.>
Yes, that must have been hard – she had to think about her body AND ignore food? Hard for baby dog brains!
>So I expected me standing up with it open for the first time would be really difficult, but no issue at all. She even tugged, sore tooth and all, while I moved it some. She even nearly stepped on it at one point and never tried to take any, so good girl! Whippet reading ahead a few chapters again lol.>
Yes! She was GREAT!!!! I think it was a combination of the work you’ve already done with her baby dog fitness skills, plus the structure of this game (high value prop) plus the toy play which brings a more optimized arousal state which makes it much easier to ignore distractions in the environment. YAY!!!
Since this context was probably recognizable to her from the fitness work, we can also present this challenge in other contexts to help generalize it. For example, you can set up an area that is not in your usual training space and put the food container in the room. Then bring in Beat and the prop, and just put it down and get to work. So the food container is already there, you are standing, there are no context cuess that might be associated with anything else. The goal is that the distraction in the environment is the context cue to ignore the distraction (and the ‘work’ guides her to do it as well, but it will generalize in ways that don’t require work all the time either).
At first the container can be closed, then it can be open when you bring Beat into the environment! Or something that doesn’t look like a training cue: like a grocery bag filled with treat bags and toy LOL! Feel free to get creative 🙂
>I forgot about the tooth and tried to warm up with some tugging, which again ended abruptly with her licking and pawing the side of her face. I thought best in a public place to not take a chance that her tooth would hurt and that she’d try to leave the game unexpectedly and just go to food. >
Very smart! Since you couldn’t really manage the tooth and it might have made things unpredictable in an environment that was already fluid, it was absolutely correct to go to the food here. Great job recognizing that you needed to bring her arousal back to the optimal state (you can do little tricks for cookie chasing for that too!)
The sends looked good! She had some nice arousal regulation getting built into the ready game element of it – she was jumping up at first but then that went away pretty quickly.
She was super strong with the forward/sideways/backwards sending! You can start to add more countermotion in – I think the markers will make all the differnce on that (see below).
The lateral distance also went well – keep adding that lateral distance so you can be pretty far away. But also add in going to the tossed cookie reward with her, being next to her – then when she gets it, staying close to her as you move forward so she drives ahead of you to the prop. That will build nicely into the rear crosses that we will use soon too! As soon as you see her driving ahead of you to the prop, you can start adding the rear crosses.
> I didn’t do a great job using the right marker cues, but oh well, she got a cookie for a job well done each time any way>
Totally relatable LOL! You were focusing on the mechanics and timing, so it was ‘yes’ instead of get it. But that was still a good rehearsal and she got cookies!
Going back to what you said her not seeming to be too into it – when you were using ‘yes’, she was working nicely. But when you switch to ‘get it’, did you see how she almost looked surprised, and then got faster and more snappy in her response?
Since we don’t have electrodes in her brain 🙂 I conjecture that the markers like ‘get it’ are directly related to dopamine spikes (reward prediction errors) along with lines of what they saw in the original dopamine studies with the monkeys: the door opening marked the correct behavior and that was when the monkeys had the dopamine spike (not when they ate the food).So using the markers in that moment surprised her (in a good way :)) and that is when you see the more stimulated mechanics. The ‘yes’ marker is not as surprising (no error in prediction means no dopamine spike) so what you were seeing were mechanics rehearsal (which is still good and incredibly useful). It was the first couple of ‘get it’ that are likely to be what produces the dopamine spike, which encodes the learning and pumps up the motivated movement.
And then when she gets used to hearing the marker? It is expected, so it becomes rehearsal.
So try to get the marker in place for those first couple of reps to try to have the biggest potential impact before the learning switches to rehearsal, if that makes sense.
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
Good morning!
Her commitment to wrapping the barrel is looking good! We can start to take things to the next level:
There was some uncertainty from her about when to start moving to the barrel, so you can clarify that for her:
Line her up at your side (using a cookie to get her into position after you get the toy scrunched up in your hand is perfectly fine) so she is facing the barrel. Hold her collar – then let go and step to the barrel. That will be a really clear cue to begin, plus it is the framework we are going to use for adding the verbals 🙂And we can also have you start doing the FCs sooner and sooner:
For this level of the game, your starting position relative to the barrel doesn’t change – the timing of your FC changes by getting earlier and earlier.
So you can do an entire session with her on the same side of you – and put a line on the ground for you to use as a visual: when she gets to that line, you do the FC. And that line begins to move closer and closer to you (to the entry spot) so your FC is earlier and earlier 🙂When you praise and present the toy as part of the FC, she hits the barrel. So, to avoid rehearsal of hitting the barrel – do the FC at the correct time (based on where your line on the ground is) but don’t praise and don’t show the toy until after she exits the barrel. That way you are adding more challenge to the handling without accidentally building in touching the barrel with her booty 🙂
Great job here!
TracyGood morning! This went great! He smoked you every time, especially when you tried to win by tossing the cookie and taking off – he still won LOL!! So fun!!!!!
So next steps for this driving ahead game: instead of 3-2-1-get it, you can use GO GO GO – as soon as the toy hits the ground, start saying GO GO GO then let him go and run.
And since this went so well – you can go to the collection sandwich games which uses this in the advanced level (which he will get to quickly, because the baby level will be easy for him).
Great job!!!
Tracy
Good morning!
The tunnel threadle section here was basically perfect: attaching the verbal before letting him (or you 🙂 ) move. And changing his position to add more challege but also not changing it so much that he would end up facing the other end of the tunnel, which would be correct with the tunnel verbal. Click/treat to you! And his responses were spot on. So – onwards to adding the tunnel threadle verbal and then we will add more motion to it all.
>Strike a pose – this is our second session of it. I’m trying really hard not to move the target to him. I’ve done this before with just my hand – which may have been easier for him.>
This also went well! You were good about not moving the target hand towards him – you did drop it lower a little as he was coming in, but that is ok for now.
He had a slightly delayed response in terms of coming to the target hand –
About what made this a little challenging: he was having a little bit of trouble ignoring the food in the other hand: “BUT MOM THERE ARE COOKIES AND I AM STARVED” haha so the impulse control challenge was higher, especially on the first side. It is possible that when you did it with just your hand, the cookies were not as visible in the other hand?The target in the hand will end up being more salient as we add other challenges, and we can also work the challenge of “drive directly to the target hand even with something exciting on the other side”. He has probably slept on it and knows it now LOL!! So you can start with food in that hand, then work up to putting a toy in that hand – then eventually the food (empty bowl or MM) and toy can go on the floor! Those will be big, enticing visuals so you can shake the target hand (and keep looking at it like you did, that was great!)
>Second attempt at the combo – blind, then decel. I’m trying to decel earlier, not sure if I accomplished that or not.>
You are decelerating sooner for sure, and he is reading it quicker too. I think my favorite rep in terms of decel timing was at 1:20 – you did the blind then took one more step, then decelerated. That gave him the info the earliest which allowed him to sort out his mechanics better. On the other reps you were decelerating 2 or 3 steps after the blind – so keep aiming for the first step after the blind, or even decelerated as you are doing the blind.
You can move forward to adding the Go Go Go after the pivot here (throwing something ahead for him to drive to) and you can also start the Handling Combos with the barrel – I think that will be easy for him!
Great job!
TracyGood morning!
>And while a big focus of this class is to teach them to be safe, the heights they are landing from seem… extreme. >
It is a lot of bang on the joints for sure!!
> But, an unexpected benefit of this class is that they teach a lot about jumping in collection, which I haven’t done a ton of with any of my dogs, so that part is helpful.>
Ah that makes sense – a lot of the disc tricks do involve collection before takeoff so the dogs don’t over-shoot the disc or the handler.
>One thing I learned is that J does not like ‘run’ as his drive ahead verbal. He really likes GO GO GO! so he will have a different word from Mo, which I’m sure won’t wrinkle my brain at all (sigh – I’m hoping it helps stave off dementia). But the difference in his response was fascinating to me. I was also trying to connect with him more, so I suspect it was the combination of all of that, but I definitely noticed a different response to the word.>
That is really interesting! Must be something about the energy or how it changes your body language. It is great that you tried it! More on that below!
Video 1:
Looking at the RCs:The key is going to be what he sees as he is at liftoff of the jump before the RC jump (the jump after the tunnel in this case). On GO reps and the RCs reps, you were facing forward at that jump, so his options were to go straight or go right.
On the RC reps, you showed the RC info after he had made the go straight decision based on the info. So he did get the left turns but they were after landing.
Ideally, as he is lifting off for the jump before the RC jump, you are already showing the RC info by facing the center of the next bar and moving to it (he will drive past you). You were facing forward before doing that, which made the cue a little late.
Here is the visual of what I mean:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1_jLvS5DGxsCKlRcgJvGjIM7H0kRmfSCa-o8Skvwcn3U/edit?usp=sharing
Looking at the run versus go verbals – yes, I think the GO verbal changes the physical cue in a helpful way!
At :50 your “run” cue is quieter and you were behind at :52 so he curled in and came off the line.
Next 2 reps had the go verbal. When you were saying GO, it was louder (more energy verbally tends to propel our dogs away!) and when you were saying GO, you also dropped your shoulders more. That all really supported the line and he totally go it! Yay!
Be careful to NOT say Go when you are ding the RC. At 1:38 for example, you said go go left so he took off straight for the RC jump) (and were facing straight on the jump before it) so he turned left on jump 3 on there line instead of jump 2 🙂 You can use your left/right directionals on these types of RCs.
2nd video – the Cato board helps with the start lines! Yay! But remember that it doesn’t magnetically hold the dog in position 🙂 so set up short successful lead outs with a lot of connection to reduce any failure/frustration potential.
Good job on the go line!
>I had a hard time getting him to send to the tunnel – I had to go a lot deeper than I anticipated, which wasn’t a problem on this sequence, but was harder on the next one.>
Looking at the video, it was not that you needed to go closer to it – it was more that you were turning away from it too soon (as he was exiting the previous obstacle) on some of the reps, so he followed the physical cues and didn’t take the tunnel. You were saying tunnel but turning your shoulders and motion away from it, so he was following that line.
I grabbed some screenshots of that too in the link above (along with the shots of when you were much clearer at the end, and he drove to it really well!)
He was reading the wrap cues well – to tighten the wrap and keep the bar up, start the wrap cues (verbal and decel) as he is in the air over the previous jump. Then you can also add more exit line connection (dog side arm way back and big eye contact :)) after the FC, so he can find the new line really fast as he finishes the FC. This is especially important with the huge visual of the a-frame/tunnel behind you as you moved out of the cross.
3rd video –
Looking at the blind cross – I agree, your connection was great! It was the line of motion causing him to take 3 (or not :))Your timing was also good, especially on that first rep. Note how on the first rep you are moving to 4 the whole time – so you finish the blind, connect, and run forward and he gets it. Same thing on the lat rep – forward motion through the blind to 4.
On the reps where he didn’t take 4 (:32 and 1:36) – you were a little closer to 3 when you did the blind and also moving sideways instead of directly forward. It was that sideways motion that cued hm to not take 4. So keep running forward to get that smooth line there.
I think the sideways motion was because you were concerned about 5 – for the RC on 5, you can run forward to 4 then decelerate to set the RC line on 5, turning to face the center of the bar, then moving forward to it as he catches up to you.
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
