K9 Genius

I've been teaching Gimme to high-five... something I usually work on when I'm at my parents' place.  I start with her sitting on the bed and then I stand in front of her to train it - with the bowl of treats on the night stand..

Initially I'd present my hand with verbal "paw" for her to touch with her paw.  Once she did it with the presentation, I stopped giving the verbal "paw" cue and also gradually started pulling my hand back before she touched it.  She didn't like me pulling my hand back and I think that was related to some other stuff I've done where I'd take my hand away if she got it wrong, thus she perceived pulling the hand back as saying she was wrong.  So I did it much more gradually and rewarded copiously and we got through that hump.

Over time we've gotten a really nice high-five to my hand signal... she's facing me and I keep my elbow tucked and present my right palm at my shoulder.  I wanted the hand signal to be distinctly different from the "down" hand signal - my hand going up over my head and down again.  Gimme responds by high-fiving with her left paw.

Last night I decided to teach her to high-five with her right paw... which I signaled the same way, but using my left hand.  It took just a dozen treats to work her through the whole shaping sequence up to a reliable right paw high-five on the hand signal.  Then I was able to alternate cues and have her know which paw to use for the high-five. 

As if that wasn't enough... I then decided she needed to understand the difference between left high-five, right high-five, and a high-ten.  She already knows "pretty", so I just spent a dozen treats attaching a hand signal (both hands up in the high-five signals).  She was able to give me one of the three behaviors with about an 80% reliability.  I was suitably impressed.

I tried to show it to my Mom today, but that was too much distraction for such a young behavior.  We have a lot of work to do... the goal is for Gimme to give me the correct behavior:

• on verbals alone
• regardless of my orientation to her
• with her on the floor instead of raised surface
• siting or standing

It occurs to me that I probably should have planned ahead when devising my hand signals... because now I'm going to be having to keep it straight in my head that when I want her right paw I use my opposite hand, and vice versa.  It probably would have been much simpler for me if I'd done it right-hand-right-paw.  I doubt it would make any difference to her.

I'll have to think about whether I want to do that.  If I decide to change it, I'll alter the cue... to be more like hand over my heart.  She's so damn smart that I'm sure she'd get it very quickly.  She still has issues with waiting for cues (i.e. self control), but in other ways her understanding of stuff is sooooo sophisticated.