I love that the online courses we are doing keep my mind hopping with training thoughts and ideas. Here are some random thoughts for your consideration:
“Sit. Sit. Sit.” means the dog doesn’t understand the cue — and neither does the human, truth be told.
The sequence should be cue — behavior and not nag-nag-nag-nag — behavior (with a shove on the rump).
If I say “sit” and the dog wags her tail I should understand that as a sign that I have not trained my dog to sit.
Not a big deal — just train it.
How?
Start with a lure and once you can reliably get the behavior with a lure, add the word, “sit” as you lure. You get one verbal “sit” — no repeating the word — and so you want to make sure the behavior is reliable with a lure BEFORE you name it.
Same with everything — dogs do not actually speak English and so the secret is to teach the behavior first and then teach them the English word (or whatever you language you choose to use).
Can you imagine learning another language by having someone say random words at you, repeating the word over and over, and then getting annoyed when you do not understand?!
ACK!
You need that person to show you the cat, and then say the word.
Of course, you won’t know if the word means the color or some other aspect of the cat — but it is a start and much better than repeating “el gato” over and over and expecting you to understand with nary a cat in sight.
Changing environment changes everything. “Sit” in the comfort of home is not the same as “sit” in the face of distractions, and so it is normal to need to take a few steps back and use the lure again.
Remember — “Knows it at home” is a different skill set than “Knows it in the face of two giant St. Bernards.”
Repeating a word or words to encourage continuation of a desired behavior can be a great learning tool. I frequently use, “Good Stay” or “Good Sit” while working on duration of a stay, for example.
Teach the release word with the stationary behaviors. Some years again I changed what “sit” and other stationary behaviors mean — no more self-releasing.
It just did not make sense to me to teach a self-releasing behavior when in the ring, that never happens. When a dog is asked to sit, down, or stand in the ring there is always an expectation that they wait until released — so why train those behaviors any other way?
In the beginning, the sequence is quick — lure for sit, and lure for release. Once that is solid, I name both behaviors, and gradually build duration of the sit/down/stand before the release.
This has made teaching wait and stay easy peasy, as you can imagine.
What happens if the dog gets up before the release?
This: “Self,” I say, “the dog is not ready for that duration.”
When you assume good intentions of the dog, you will be prompted to examine your own training behavior and invited to create ethical and fair solutions to training glitches.
