I have trained more horses than dogs. An animal 'learns' by guessing at the answer to the 'question'. The most important facet of teaching is figuring HOW our dog or horse learns; how it wants to be taught.
I had one horse who would try his heart out but invariably guessed wrong sometimes. He wasn't being "bad" or "stubborn" or "stupid", he simply guessed wrong. He knew he was trying very hard and would get impatient with me if I didn't stay patient with him and give him a chance to guess at a different answer. When he guessed "right" I would stop our work and go nuts over him. His reward was a sugar cube and scritches between his ears...his favorite place. In time, he understood that my questions meant there were answers and that he needed to answer me. He got better at guessing, I got better at asking him in a way that made him feel safe and confident.
Our dogs are guessing too. They have no idea that they have to behave in a certain, undog -like manner. We are teaching them OUR way of doing things and it's pretty foreign to them. We are teaching them OUR language. Our rules.
I hate to see punishment for a wrong guess. We just start over, do it again. When the guess results in the answer we're looking for we reinforce that...YES, YOU GUESSED RIGHT. As they learn and become confident as to what "sit" "come" "touch" means, they no longer have to guess. Because they are confident. They know the answer!
To me training is asking the question and then rewarding the right answer. We dismiss all the wrong answers by simply starting over.[/QUOTE]
That's a great line!
Olliver's only class faux pas involved recall and a tennis ball distraction.
Being the ultimate ball hound lately, he could not get past the idea that he had to come to mom, across the large space, in between two people throwing a tennis ball over his head.
Lol. My poor 7 month old.
It took the third try for him to understand those hot dogs were staying in my pocket until he ignored Wilson.
Thereafter he did 5 perfect recalls.
He finally understood the question "Ollie can you please, please, please leave the sacred ball alone for 5 seconds and come to your mama?"
And then he answered correctly