RFE practice (54)

I decided after last week's parkour class where Gimme was focused right from the start, to try a short attention session here and see if I get the same results. I'll let you be the judge. 

"mark" video - Please notice the fancy target I made for this - it's a quilting star pattern created from colored duct tape. I wanted something visual and distinct from any of our other props. We haven't trained this very often and it is a behavior chain, so I end up covering the same shaping each time, though it does go faster each time. Actually, having just this moment said it is a "behavior chain" makes me realize I'm not training it like a behavior chain - which is last part of the behavior is trained first and then the behavior before the last behavior, etc., until I've trained back to the first behavior. Shame on me. I am shaping for a head-down on the target, but you can see by Gimme's wagging tail, she is still very intense.

Backing on board video - We are continuing to work this behavior for parkour. My first set up to work with a little elevation wasn't stable and I had to change it. So, we started with some work on the flat. For our second part of this, I elevated the board with stacks of carpet squares. This is mentally hard work for her, so to encourage Gimme to want to back away from me, I used her special "bowl", since backing away got her closer to it.  This was J'Anna's idea.


"izzy" & "otto" video - I started with her backing around/with me in "side" position to warm her to what we'd be doing. She has come such a long way with her "izzy" and "otto" behaviors. Now we are working on the advanced behavior where she does them while I pivot in the opposite direction. The first step is to ask her to do the behavior twice before getting rewarded. Then I start moving. It's entirely expected for her to be confused by my movement initially - it's a huge change in conditions. Still, Gimme is very smart, so she very quickly figures out how to do this variation. 

"pivot" video - This behavior starts with sending her to put her front feet on the "brick" and then her CCW "pivot". My plan was to work on it as a distance behavior, but then I noticed she was not keeping her feet on the prop, so I worked on this first. You can see she is eager to get to me and the rewards and that is why she's stepping off in my direction before she completes the move, so I start moving in to reward her with her feet on the prop. Just one reward in position and you see her come off the prop and then self-correct. She doesn't stick it and we have to keep working on it to get consistency, but you have to appreciate how smart she is. 

Back into "under" video - I wanted to teach her to back into "under" so she'd get comfortable with it. I want to teach her how to do back-through-weaves. Of course I don't really know how to teach this yet, but this seemed to be a logical first step. 

Sidepass into dog video - J'Anna and I are both having difficulty teaching our dogs to sidepass when we are moving toward them and they must move away while staying in "heel" or "side" position. So I came up with the idea of creating an exagerated body cue so Gimme would know when I was going to step toward her, so she could move out of my way. To start with the exagerated version of the cue is to bend the knee closest to her while keeping my toes on the ground. Over time I want to make it a more subtle knee bend, which will be followed by sliding my foot toward her. Based on how quickly she picked this up in this short experiment with it, I think it has promise.

"can" & "spin" video - The goal behavior is to get on the "can" and then "spin". She did it one time on cue, but not again. Each attempt afterward, her back feet would come off the prop. She used to do this readily, so I'm not sure why it's an issue now. There have been times when she had discomfort in her loin area, but I'm not seeing any sign of that now. It's possible she remembers and it makes her tense, affecting her balance. At the same time I'm mindful her balance on narrow boards isn't as good as it was earlier this year. Perhaps the extra 4 pounds she's carrying is affecting how limber she is and balance. I tried several things, none of which gave me the results I want. I'm going to try having her just balance on the "can" for longer periods, in case it's a confidence issue. As much as J'Anna makes me a bit crazy with her suggestions, sometimes they lead to something productive. So when I do the confidence building work, I'll want to focus on her foot position. I want to reinforce the times when her rear feet are more toward the edge (not the middle) of the surface, since it makes her more balanced (like at 40 seconds). I absolutely need to use the clicker so I can pinpoint in the spin right before her feet come off. I also have to watch my treat delivery so I'm not lifting her nose and throwing her center of gravity back (which causes the back feet to move toward center). 

"away" video - The goal is to teach Gimme to stand in the same position as "center", but facing "away". The platform is supposed to help anchor her, the target stick help her make the turn and feed in position to reinforce the position. I think I need a treat on the target stick to start with, or maybe use her special "bowl".

Right in the middle of that session, Gimme suddenly noticed a whiny little dog, being held in it's owner's arms (just arrived), who was backed up to the ring gate with the little dog's heiney and fluffy tail hanging into our ring. As Gimme moved to go there I yelled at the owner "lady move away from the gate". Naturally she was completely offended, never giving any thought to how careless she'd been with her dog's safety. Little dog owners are the worst, often completely clueless about the safety of their vulnerable little guys. 

Focus after distraction video - Gimme was highly distracted from then on. Since the little dog continued to whine, I had to abandon what we were doing, move farther away and work on focus. She did better with the distance and moving. You can hear the continual wailing and screeching in the background. It's to her credit she works through this at all. It's a hard place to work in respect to noise in the background. 

Overall I thought the sessions went well.  So far I do think having the short attention session before the training sessions is beneficial.