Training new skills often follow the same path. Once you understand the steps, you can often devise a new game plan for training new things with your dog.
Step 1: Get the behavior
Often times, we lure the dog with a treat to get the behavior we want. For example, if I want to train my dog to circle, I hold a treat in front of their nose, and circle my hand around, the dog follows the treat, completing the circle. Yes, it’s bribery, but it’s a simple communication tool that effectively conveys the idea to the dog.
Step 2: Reward instead of lure
What’s the difference between luring and rewarding? Basically, where is the treat? If the treat is in your hand in front of the dog’s nose, then you are luring. If the treat is in your pocket, and you don’t take it out (or keep your hand in your pocket), then it becomes a reward. Think of it this way: It’s the difference of paying the contractor up front, or waiting until the job is done. We want to move on quickly to rearding. If we continue to lure to get the behavior, the dog comes rely on the treat to their nose, and has a harder time moving on to putting it on cue.
Step 3: Start with a cue
There’s a flow to every trained behavior – you’ll often hear it referred to as the ABCs of training.
A=Antecedent (physical &/or verbal cue)
B= Behavior
C=Consequence (reward)
In our example, the motion you use with the treat as a lure will often become your physical cue. The circular motion you made with your hand can become the physical cue to ask the dog to spin without the treat. You can now add a verbal cue, such as “Spin” or “Topsy”.
You can use both a verbal and physical cue for clearer communication, or use only one. Dogs tend to be more aware of our body language, so not surprisingly, they respond easier to a physical cue. In one study, the trainer gave the dog conflicting cues – a physical cue (such as raising their hand for sit) and a different verbal cue (such as saying “Shake”). The dogs overwhelmingly followed the physical cue.
There are several more steps to fully train the behavior, such as training it in different locations to help the dog generalize and understand that they can respond to our cues in different locations. There is also training to increase duration (such as a sit/stay), to be able to do things when there are distractions (such as being able to sit when a squirrel runs by), and to be able to do it at a distance (as when a herding dog drops to the ground far from the handler when herding sheep). But that’s a conversation for a future blog……