Lots of great lessons were discovered during my recent time out west. There is one lesson though, that I find myself repeating over and over again when I teach, and yet still I don’t see the change in people’s behaviour. You know the old saying “If you always do what you have always done, you will always get what you have always gotten.” Just like in dog training, if you don’t get the results you hope for, you need to look at your approach to your problem. I have changed my approach to this deliemma ALOT over the years while teaching people. My efforts have produced only moderate success at getting people to alter their behaviour. In my opinion this could be the single biggest reason why dogs stress in agility. It could be responsible for the dogs that stress low exhibiting their stress with sniffing, wandering off, shutting down and also why dogs stress high–running off to do “zoomies” or just grabbing obstacles without their handlers. I have no science to back up my theory, but if this isn’t the biggest reasons dogs slow down or lose focus on their handlers in agility, it sure is r-e-a-l-l-y close to the top.
So what is the reason? To find out you have to sign up to my newsletter. I just completed a podcast for everyone and for now it is free for all to download. Remember I said if you don’t see the change you are looking for in your training you need to change your approach, so this is my change of approach. You get to have me yakking in your ear for ten minutes to try and drive my point home to you.
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Please everyone after you listen to the podcast be sure to come back and leave a comment here to let me know what you think of it.
Today I am grateful that the internet dude is coming to fix my connection today, love Starbucks, but love convenience more!
Ok just trying something different here for a change of pace, let me know what you think! Today I am grateful that I get to go home tomorrow!!! My flight is at 3:15 pm and I am stoked!
I had small workshop here yesterday with 9, mostly adolescent dogs, and their handlers. It went quite well with a few “aah ha” moments and the odd “oh my” thrown in to balance things out. We started the day with some grids and body awareness exercises and then finished up the afternoon with some handling drills. Working with dogs that have a solid foundation of Crate Games makes handling drills so much easier. Not only do the dogs have the understanding of control behaviours (necessary for a great start line) but the understand is also there to ‘explode’ off the start line once the dog gets his release cue. In my 15+ years competing in agility I have only ever had one dog break a start line (and she only did it two or three times). That is seven dogs, with a combined experience of 43 years trialing in agility with less than 4 broken start lines in total and none since 1998. Crate Games is a big reason for this understanding. I would guess that CGs could be one of the most under-utilized program I have. I think most people are like, “oh yeah, I did that. . . next skill!” There are so many fundamentals to teach an agility dog, and you just can’t wait to get on with them all, so it easy to gloss over the less “sexy” ones in favour of the ones that appear to be more “agility-like.” I don’t want this blog to sound like an informercial for my stuff, but quite honestly everything in my program comes back to Crate Games so it is worth the extra time. I was forwarded an email last week that was sent to info@clickerdogs.com from someone asking if I thought there was anything in the DVD that would help with obedience “stays.” Aaaah yeah, of course there is. But it will help ANY dog sport in so many ways, as it is the ultimate activity to introduce the concept of the transfer of value. Sure you have a model to work distractions so that all of the toy-throwing and run bys on the contacts or weave poles training will seem like a walk in the park to your dog, but you will have so much more.
Seven-week old puppy "Export" being an "expert!"
More distraction work, holding his sit in position with food distractions on the floor in front of him.
In addition to the control you gain, you will also be teaching drive! Both the drive to move one ahead of you in agility and drive as in motivation. So if you are working on increasing speed or building more intensity, refer back to you DVD before you do anything else. It will make a difference if you apply the program as it is outlined on the DVD. I could go on but really, dust of your disc and watch it again please, this time with intent! Okay take a look at these pictures of Tracy Sklenar’s (one of our instructors) cute little Export as a 7 week old puppy (a few years ago). I mean really, how else do you get a 7 week old puppy working through distractions like this! Check him out learning to drive ahead . . . his first gamble at 7 weeks old, how cute is that?? Did I mention he is only 7 weeks (you should see him now, fast and yet with lots of self control).
One KEY thing I would change if I was doing the DVD again is the use of the wire crate. I had to use the wire crates to make the DVD so you (the viewer) could see what the dog was doing. However, when I teach this to my own dogs I use a hard shell crate. That way I can be more enthusiastic and throw the cookies into the crate during the “You’re Out-You’re In” stage. Wire is not a problem, I know lots of people that use them with great success but I myself don’t use them much. In the DVD I ‘hand’ the cookies to the dog (to prevent them flying out the back through the wires) but in reality I throw ‘em.
The start of distance work! Puppy Exie driving away from Tracy into his crate.
Group shot of Crate Games graduates.
Here is a picture I almost hate to put in because of the stereotypical pigeon-hole Crate Games is already put in. . . working stays. But I will do it anyway, this is our instructors dogs chilling in their crates during a puppy camp. Yes puppies are running all over the place having fun and clearly it is not concerning these dogs. In case you haven’t seen this before, here is a short clip highlighting some of the CG benefits. Export is the ripe old age of 9 weeks when we shot this video. Too funny. It was also nice to see the short little clip of my girlie Twister who appeared briefly with the other three dogs I owned at the time (before Feature’s day) during the opening. www.youtube.com/watch?v=ebjBo_spqG0&feature=channel_page
Today I am grateful that John is such a sound sleeper as it is 11:00 PM (way past my bedtime) and I am jammin’ to this old Grand Funk song as he is sawing logs. This song (FootStoompin’ Music) reminds me of my brother Steve. I don’t know how he is able to hear today. When we were kids he would take the two stereo speakers off the stands and place them on the floor facing each other about 2′ apart. Then he would turn up the tunes full blast and lay his head on the floor between the two speakers! Oh my! I guess it is not so different to what some kids do with their ipod today eh?
Educational, entertaining or inspiring. That has been a goal of my blog writing. I want visiting here to be a positive experience, where you go away feeling good about yourself, your dogs or life in general. I am not a big “blog” reader myself, but of the few that I have read I have found some of the entries to be either long, drawn accounts of what the blogger did that day, or a bitter tale of how unfair things are and how life should be different. I am definitely a “the-glass-is-half-full” or even ”three-quarter-full” and possibly ”over-flowing” kind of girl. I am a person that thinks in terms of abundancy rather than scarcity.
I am grateful to all of the people who are willing to bare their humility in the name of allowing others to be educated, entertained or inspired while watching their training on my blog. There is an old saying that goes “if you can’t be a glowing example, be a tragic warning”. So we get a bit of both today with Marilynn sacrificing herself in the name of education. Now Maryilyn has done some great training with her dog “Debit”. He is drivey, has a good retrieve and has great focus for his job. However, Marilyn has a few mechanical details she needs to iron out. In the name of your best education, I would advise you all to watch this clip first with the sound turned off so you can play the role of coach. I have already told you some of what she is doing well, now without the volume, you try to pick out the areas of 2×2 training that need improvement. Then watch it again and see if you were able to come to the same conclusions I do.
I love Marilynn’s enthusiasm. Note how much fun she is having with her dog. That should be a goal for everyone. Training should make you laugh and be a source of joy. . . yes, even when we struggle. With each struggle there is an opportunity to improve and what an awesome rush that is when the dog & you finally “get it!”
Today I am grateful to Marilynn and people like her that have graciously supplied their training clips to me. Check out Cat at http://strata2×2.blogspot.com/ who is blogging about her 2×2 training. Maybe I will get a chance in the future to show a clip of what she is doing.
Hi all, I trust you are all enjoying a great holiday season with your friends and family. John and I went to one of my brother for Christmas dinner last night. We had a blast. My sister-in-law Pat, made about a zillion vegetable dishes for me, and lucky John was in his glory, as Pat prepared roast beef & yorkies (she knows the way to the Brit’s heart). I really don’t get to see my family as often as I should, so it was great to be able to spend the evening with some of them.
Okay back to business. Again I have to thank everyone for the glowing reviews of the new DVD. I am so thrilled you are all enjoying it AND that the dogs are progressing fast, just like I predicted they would! I will re-state, as I mention in the DVD, not all dogs will be weaving in 12 days. Some have done it in only 4, others will take longer. What I do know is that your dog will learn ALOT faster with this method then with the other weave pole training methods out there. I hate to pick on you, but once again it is believing in your dog that is going to be the big difference. Allow the dog to choose! Here are the latest weave pole questions that have come in to me.
Now take a look at these two as they work through the early stages of 2×2 training with their dogs (both non-border collies for all of you that have been writing telling me it wouldn’t work as fast or the same way:)). In this first clip you will see a young woman named Lene train her dog Sisi. At one point she integrates Crate Games with her weave training. That is super! Crate Games, which are the foundation of my training program, are trained the same way as 2×2′s. It is all about creating VALUE for something and then allowing the dog CHOOSE correctly. Value and Choice, over and over! Rather than waiting for your dog to choose to go into his crate (stage 3 of crate games) you are waiting for your dog to choose to leave you to drive towards the 2 poles (stage 2 of 2×2 weave training). So if you have trained Crate Games already, by starting your 2×2 with a couple rounds of Crate Games first, reminds your dog that you are not going to help him, but that he must CHOOSE on his own!
You can see the full clip of Lene training Sisi at her youtube account by clicking on this link. Don’t forget to leave her a comment and tell her what a great job she is doing, everyone loves that reinforcement!
Next lets watch Barb train her awesome little Terrier ”Blast”. Again some super dog training as Barb hits the reward line with her throws and spends tons of time tugging in between repetitions. Barb posted this video on Facebook and I got her permission to post it here (through Youtube, which is why you may think it is a Youtube video but it is not). You can contact Barb by becoming a Friend of mine on Facebook and from there you can find Barb & Blast. I will try to get to all of the video’s I have been sent, but I am sorry I can not promise to post them or get back to all of you, however I will do what I can. Good work everyone!
I am gratefully for brother Steve, his wife Pat and (now, fully grown kids) Mike, Jeff & Kate. It was a great evening and John and I really enjoyed our Christmas dinner with the five and them plus Mike’s girlfriend Celeste and one of my other six brothers, Brent.
Okay guys, I got such a positive response the last time I presented this format here on the blog and since I couldn’t get the hologram to work I decided to go back to this format once again. Since this session would have gone on for ever, and I found out that YouTube doesn’t like anything longer than 10 minutes, I have eliminated half the questions that have been sent and I will answer those separately, likely tomorrow. For now I just cut and past these questions and ripped through them in less than 15 minutes Fastest blog entry for me to date! Now, as one of my instructors pointed out, you can can multi-task, doing things like the dishes, as you catch up on my blog!
As I said in this clip if you would like to get on our newsletter please just sign up at our website. For those of you that are needing it, here is a direct link to my Success with One Jump DVD that I mentioned in today’s blog.
Today I am very grateful to UPS, as they finally got our Canadian shipment of the new 2×2 Weave Training DVDto us!
I decided to go back to this format once again. Since this session would have gone on for ever, and I found out that YouTube doesn’t like anything longer than 10 minutes, I have eliminated half the questions that have been sent and I will answer those separately, likely tomorrow. For now I just cut and past these questions and ripped through them in less than 15 minutes Fastest blog entry for me to date! Now, as one of my instructors pointed out, you can can multi-task, doing things like the dishes, as you catch up on my blog!
