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Teaching new things

Discussion in 'Behavior' started by Eleonora, Feb 16, 2014.

  1. Eleonora

    Eleonora Forums Regular

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    Finland
    My friend has a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, Lotta, who is one and a half years old. We thought that we would create a new thread where we can discuss about her training and behavior. :smile2: So we thought that we would start by telling you how Lotta behaves in training and which methods my friend uses and/or what are suitable for Lotta.

    Her dog is sometimes hard to be trained because she's acting silly. That's why my friend must have pauses in training. There are at least three reasons why the dog is acting silly in training. One reason is that the dog thinks my friend is only her playmate. Another reason is that she thinks she'll get treats by acting silly. The third reason for her dog acting silly is that when she notices my friend starts training her, she gets excited about it. First she acts otherwise same way as a puppy in the video except she barks and might sit.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLMJH-Wtrsk

    After this my friend might get her dog to do several times some thing. Sometimes her dog focuses too much on acting silly so my friend doesn't get her dog to do anything at all.

    Her dog sometimes just stares at her and waggs her tail because she doesn't get that she should do something else. When the dog is acting silly, it helps when the wanted behavior is divided in small parts and she's always rewarded after taking just a little step for the right direction.
    Not always then either it's easy to get her dog to do anything.

    My friend uses a clicker because her dog sometimes moves so fast and she wouldn't otherwise have enough time to reward her dog when she does something right. My friend should be able to reward Lotta at that exact moment because Lotta doesn't get that she should do some certain thing. There is only a small window of opportunity in doing so and after that Lotta might already do something else. Besides in finnish "good" might sometimes sound long. That is one reason why my friend uses a clicker with Lotta. Lotta may not always hear a verbal praise and that is another reason because: otherwise it is sometimes hard to reward her dog because she reacts differently to speak and a click.

    This is not only about Lotta: Lotta often concentrates on something else and behaves sometimes like no one has said anything and like she wouldn't "hear" anything like those dogs in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N9hy174JVro Lotta behaves often that way also in training. Besides, my friend has read for example in here http://www.clickertraining.com/node/72 that a click affects differently to brain than words do.

    My friend has read earlier that in clicker training the verbal cue is not used before the dog knows the behavior. She has also read why it isn't used before the dog knows the behavior and she just found an article about it. Understanding Learned Irrelevance in Dog Training She thinks that she cannot name the behavior immeadiately at the beginning, because when her dog does it at the beginning, it doesn't look similar as the end behavior.
     
  2. dmeyer123

    dmeyer123 Forums Enthusiast

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    OK, that puppy is so stinkin' cute, she could get away with anything around here. Have fun training her!! I used to take Lexi for long walks, before training to get some energy off her, so she could focus.....
     
  3. Sullivan

    Sullivan Forums Enthusiast

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  4. Eleonora

    Eleonora Forums Regular

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    Finland

    [FONT=&quot]Actually the puppy in the video is someone else's dog. His name is Charlie and he is just of the same breed. Actually [/FONT][FONT=&quot]Lotta is already one and a half yearsold. We don't have own videos of Lotta. We once tried to make a video, but it didn't work out so well. My friend also doesn't want to put videos to youtube where anyone can see them. However, my friend has found few videos including the video of that puppy where the dog behaves by the same way as Lotta does. This is how Lotta behaves:
    [/FONT]
    Lotta acts silly and that's why she is sometimes hard to be trained.
    Lotta behaves by the ways we told because she is a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel. Because Lotta acts silly when my friend tries to train her, it's sometimes difficult for my friend to figure out what to teach for Lotta and how. She needs advice on dog training.

    For example, we have created two threads:

    http://sheltieforums.com/showthread.php?t=20509

    http://sheltieforums.com/showthread.php?t=20438

    You may want to check them out.
     
  5. Eleonora

    Eleonora Forums Regular

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    Finland
    Lotta acts silly and that's why she is sometimes hard to be trained.
    We have asked about take and drop in this thread: http://sheltieforums.com/showthread.php?t=20438
    We have written also new messages there.
     
  6. Calliesmom

    Calliesmom Moderator

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    I suggest that you find a local trainer who can observe your issues and tailor a training program to the dog.
     
  7. Eleonora

    Eleonora Forums Regular

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    Finland
    [FONT=&quot]My friend has taken Lotta to courses and she is going to take Lotta to them again as soon as she can. She would like to discuss about dog training in this forum until then.

    People seems to have wrong ideas about things. We have just tried to correct them in another thread.

    [/FONT]
     
    Last edited: Mar 20, 2014
  8. Caro

    Caro Moderator

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    I think your friend needs to take a step back. Often a dog acts silly because it doesn't understand what is wanted from it. It sounds like your friend may need to go back to basics with training. Is she using the clicker alone or with other rewards? Perhaps she should teach the clicker again as the dog may not understand what the clicker is about. Cavaliers are not that stupid - I know plenty that have advanced obedience titles. A training course use actually targeted for the handler to learn how to teach their dog and it sounds like that is what your friend may need.
     
  9. Eleonora

    Eleonora Forums Regular

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    Finland
    It's other way around. Sometimes Lotta is concentrating so much on acting silly that she doesn't notice or understand that my friend is trying to teach her something. We told in the first message why Lotta acts silly.



    "Her dog sometimes just stares at her and waggs her tail because she doesn't get that she should do something else. When the dog is acting silly, it helps when the wanted behavior is divided in small parts and she's always rewarded after taking just a little step for the right direction." That's why Lotta can be teached to do only easy things at this stage.


    Lotta knows what a click means. My friend always gives treats to Lotta after a click. My friend would like to use also a play as a reward. That's why we created that other thread. However, my friend doesn't understand all of the suggestions. That's why we have made new questions there.

     

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