Category: How Dogs Learn

Look and Listen

MICHAEL BAUGH CPDT-KA, CDBC

HOUSTON – A lot of people think their dog has selective hearing when it comes to basic obedience cues, especially coming when called.  No matter how many times they call their dog, it seems he’s just not listening.  Some folks even worry their dog may be ignoring them out of spite.  Fortunately, that last one probably isn’t true.  He just hasn’t been trained yet to tune into you when you call.

It turns out the key to really effective dog training isn’t so much about listening.  It’s about teaching your dog to look at you.  Dogs who are keeping their eyes on you are also keeping their ears attuned to what you are saying.  In fact, most precision obedience training is really about the dog’s visual attention, not his listening.  Dogs actually learn visual cues (hand signals) more easily than they learn verbal cues (words).

Start at the beginning.  The first thing I recommend people teach their dog is eye contact.  It’s important that dogs learn to focus their attention on our faces.  It sets them up to catch our verbal instructions on the first go around.  It also allows them to better read our facial expressions for feedback on how they’re doing (dogs are experts at reading human facial expression, even subtle change in our expressions).

Here’s how to do it.  Keep some of your dogs kibble in your pocket.  Every time you catch him glancing up at your face say “yes.”  Then, immediately follow up by giving him a piece of his food.   This is called capturing a behavior.  In a short time, your dog will be watching you all the time regardless of whether or not you have food on you.  Once you he’s doing that you can start calling his name (only say it once please).  When he responds to his name with a look up to your face, immediately say “yes” and treat him.  Repeat this often so that his name becomes like a magic word that draws your dog’s attention to you immediately every time.

Before long your dog will be glued to you, watching attentively for further instructions.  Your friends will all say, “Wow he really listens.”  Of course you’ll smile and agree, because you know he’s looking at you.

 

(from myfoxhouston.com)

Potty Signals

Michael Baugh CPDT-KA, CDBC  (from All Things Dog Blog)

Dear Trainer:

Skittles’ quirk is her very quiet way of telling us she needs to go outside. I hear her because she generally sticks to me like glue. When I leave the house, Skittles does not do a very noticeable job of getting the message across to other family members. Sometimes we have accidents when I am gone. She will leave her surprises as close to the door as she can get, sometimes right at the door crack as though she wanted to put it outside but could not. Since I cannot make my family hear her quiet whine I do not know what to do. If you have ideas on how to help increase her ability to get their attention I would appreciate  it.

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When I read your very good question I couldn’t help but think of how we humans sometimes behave with each other.  I thought specifically of the time I yelled at a very good friend, “What’s the matter with you?  Do you think I can read your mind?”  He didn’t miss a beat.  “I didn’t even know you could read.” He said.  It was the rhetorical equivalent of lifting his leg on my sofa and laughing at me.

I’m not suggesting you or your family learn to read Skittles’ mind, not exactly anyway.  I do have to admit, however, I’m not a huge fan of teaching dogs to give loud signals when they want to go outside.  Certainly, you could teach Skittles to ring a bell on the doorknob with her nose signaling her desire.   Clicker training would probably be your fastest path to success.  She rings.  You click.  She goes outside for some treats, fun and potty (we hope).

Here’s the rub.  You’d be teaching Skittles to ring the bell when she wants to go outside, not necessarily when she has to go potty outside.  I dare not teach this to my dear Stella.  She’d be ringing our bell from now until the cows come home (actual cowbell optional).  It’s bad enough that she stares out the door now with her newly emptied bladder and bowels.  I digress.  Suffice it to say, the whole bell-to-go-outside thing is a bit of a slippery slope.  You may not necessarily be teaching what you want.

My guess is, you just want Skittles to stop doing two things in the house: number one and number two.  The idea, of course, is to teach her to hold it until she goes outside.  Go there, not here.  Teaching potty training is just a matter of setting Skittles up to win.  When she’s learning she should always be supervised or safely confined.  You should never ask yourself the question, “Where’s Skittles?”  (Just call me; I’ll tell you.  “She’s squatting in your dining room.”).  Supervising means you also go outside with Skittles.  Praise and treat her as soon as she’s done eliminating, right then, on the spot.

 

(Read more at All Things Dog Blog)

Swim Stella, Swim!

Michael Baugh, CPDT-KA, CDBC

“This dog can’t swim.”  That’s what I thought as I watched her struggle, bob and tip in the pond.  I was about to jump in the murky water myself when I saw Stella briefly roll onto her back and then right herself.  She stepped gleefully to the shore, shook off, dropped her ball, and looked up at me.  She had no idea how pathetic she had looked.

Of course, I was concerned.  Stella had swum before, albeit briefly.  But, this last time was different.  Physics failed her.  She listed to one side, nearly sank, and then went keel up. She was wholly out of her element, and I’d so wished her element was water.  I wanted it badly; I wanted it with every memory of the retriever before her, with every hope of the retriever I dreamt she would become.  That was the problem.  This wasn’t about me.  It was about Stella; and Stella couldn’t swim.

I tried to get my brain around it.  Maybe it really was bad physics.  Stella’s chest is unusually deep and her waist is unusually small.  She’s narrow, very narrow.  She’s tall and long, unnaturally so.  Her face and coat say retriever, but the rest of her says whippet or Italian greyhound.   Okay if I’m going to be brutally honest, if you catch her at the wrong angle the whole package screams “cartoon dog.”  Maybe her body just wasn’t built for water; maybe she was too lean, too spindly.  Maybe she just couldn’t swim.

When my heart’s breaking, I write.  So, I wrote some veterinarian friends of mine.  No, they said.  There’s nothing wrong with Stella.  She is quirky beautiful and fully buoyant.  I wrote to a local dog swim coach (who knew?) and she said the same thing.  Some dogs are naturals, others are not.  Stella can learn.  She can swim.

I can’t explain what happened next.  Sometimes there’s no way to fix a thing set askew.  Then again, sometimes there’s no holding back a thing intent on setting itself right.  Stella’s new coach is an affable woman in the middle of life, with an easy smile and a gentle feel for a dog’s spirit. She welcomed us to a long glistening pool in the early light of day.  “Does Stella like toys?” she asked.  “Tennis balls” I answered.  The rest was unstoppable.  It was the simple magic of letting things happen, letting go, swimming with the current of the moment.

Stella waded into the pool for her ball, and brought it back.  On the second throw, she leapt across the shallow slope into the deep.  Stella’s head slipped under and then popped up high in the water, a bow splashing and awkward, and a stern dragging too low.  Her coach moved with deft purpose, the subtle speed of a woman who knows her craft.  She righted Stella’s hips, bringing them level to withers just below the water’s crest.  Stella sailed with ease back to the shallows and out.  She dropped the ball and looked back at what she’d swum.

courtesy: Rummy's Beach Club

I threw again.  Again she leapt and swam.  Again, and again Stella’s body stretched, and her head skimmed the break where water meets air.  Her legs tucked naturally, fronts propelling, backs adjusting for balance.  She used her thick retriever tail like a rudder.  Stella leapt and swam.  She moved with ease and grace, ball firmly in mouth, eyes gleaming in the morning sun, nowhere to be but here, nothing in mind but now.  Stella leapt again and then swam some more.  She panted and pushed hard against the water, a wake behind her.  The air was sweet with the smell of wet dog and abandon.  I moved up beside her and kissed her cheek.  I would have loved her the same no matter, but oh how I love my water dog.

We stayed on like that until we were both soaked through, swimming together.