HazelNutMeg
Trained
We Make a Hell of a Team!
Posts: 335
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Post by HazelNutMeg on Sept 12, 2004 18:22:02 GMT -5
Okay, so how did YOU teach YOUR dog the contact zones? I want Coal to stop on the end of them, Mandi's dogs do that, I WANT MINE TO TOO! No, but seriously, I think that would help him a lot to teach him to stop at the end cuz he's COMPLETELY missing his contact zones now that I work further away from him and stuff! I've done the whole target thing, put a peice of food or whatever at the end on the contact, but it seems I gota do taht EVERY time now! I was out there today and we had to go back and redo every contact obstacle to get him to hit his zones... he could just be having an off day cuz he did seem a bit distant, usually I "lose him" once a week but I take the contacts very serious for him to hit them, for saftey reasons... So how did all you agillity goers out there teach the contact zones for your dog? I'm just wondering if a differnet method than I'm using would work better.
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Post by ripley on Sept 12, 2004 19:13:38 GMT -5
LOTS of commands is how I got Rip to learn. I don't think he'll ever look for the contact zones. First of all, I taught Ripley "STOP". When he hears this (on the agility course at least) he stops dead in his tracks and waits for a further command Second, I taught him "SLOW", which means that he can go at a slow walk. Sometimes I run him through the whole course on slow. I know these commands don't sound like they have much point but bear with me and you'll see.. Let's use the A-Frame for example. I send Ripley up the wall, and about 6 inches down, I tell him to STOP. Immediately after he stops, I tell him SLOW and he crawls down the rest, and HAS to touch the contacts, because he can't run fast enough down to jump over them. When he hits the bottom, I tell him "STOP!" again and when he does I give him a JACKPOT of praise, treats and a game of "grr". So basically, teaching the stop command, and incorporating it into agility training, will be a lifesaver, 'specially since it sounds like the Molsonator just plows through everything.
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Post by Aussienot on Sept 12, 2004 22:25:52 GMT -5
In the Teaching phase, Finn learned to Sit before exiting every contact obstacle. He has to sit with his butt and his hind legs still on in the contact zone, while his front end can be off (known as the 2 On/2 Off) to get the reward.
The Contacts were each taught separately, not in a course set up. For the first few weeks on each contact, he only got praised for the sit finish. (Tough to do on the A frame) If he missed the sit, there was no praise and we did the obstacle again.
So he never learned to jump off or miss a contact because the sit was the measure of success, not the completion of the obstacle.
Once he had the sit finish down consistently on each contact in isolation, I started sequencing with another obstacle after the contact. Instead of letting him sit, I encouraged him on to the next obstacle once or twice each session.
In Training, the sit or go on is completely random. He never knows if he'll be required to sit. In training I consistently mix it up. He doesn't get a signal until his feet hit the zone.
The key is timing your next command at the committment point, that is, when he is physically committed to hitting the contact zone and won't be pulled off early by your command.
The only time you'd let the dog consistently move on to the next obstacle would be in the Proofing stage when you are trialing or preparing to trial.
It's perhaps not the fastest way, but it's much more accurate and precise. Dogs that learn this way almost never have contact faults.
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HazelNutMeg
Trained
We Make a Hell of a Team!
Posts: 335
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Post by HazelNutMeg on Sept 13, 2004 0:20:22 GMT -5
Thanks for the answers!! That really helps me a lot! Mandi is comming over after school tomorrow to help us out too ;D When he's on the trick obsticals, like dog walk or teeter, the ones he could get really hurt on (I don't have my A-Frame up and running yet) I tell him "EASY" and he slows down and watches what he does a bit more, I taught him this by walking him over a ladder After he tripped the first couple times he learned to watch his step haha, I'm wondering if that's kina like the same as your slow command RG. He's also learning to stop on command and his left and right, been teaching this mainly on the bike but going to work on it in the yard too and on the course. He has been doing really good with weave poles! He improved a LOT today, but they still aren't all the way together, still spread apart a bit. But I have this feeling that once he learns how to weave and is more confident, he's going to be a GOOOD weaver ;D ;D Just gota train him properly, I hope I don't screw up on that like on the contacts Thanks agian guys, I'll let you know if I get any improvements by the end of the week and how the little training session with mandi went!
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