Learning Plateaus & Giant Leaps

Wowza! It took 7 sessions, but we've finally made it over the 'can't go further than 3 steps' back up hump.

All this time, if I waited for a 4th step, she would quit. Sometimes I got a 4th step by accident, but more often it was 3 steps and then, if I didn't click that, I'd get LOTS of noise with sitting, downing, targeting my foot, anything but backing up. Then I'd have to start her all over again with hind-foot movement backwards.

Tonight I set out once again to explain it to her, but she surprised me and gave me FIVE solid steps back on the first trial! And again! And again! And then I clicked a few times for 4 steps (literally stopping her in mid-backup) just because I was afraid of losing her if I kept going for 5. Didn't faze her at all, she went right back to 5 or even 6 when I let her go again!

What a great breakthrough. And so solidly, she was rhythmically stepping back right, left, right, left, right, left. It was beautiful!

Hopefully she remembers tomorrow, and if she does, I think she's ready for a cue.

Backing Up – Session 3.

Yesterday, in our second session, Luna ended the session being able to back up 3 steps consistently. She was calm, quiet and focused. So was I.

Our third session today had a lot of changes. We worked in the living room instead of the kitchen. I used cheese instead of kibble. The camera was filming.

In short, this was pretty crappy. I lumped, I clicked when she stopped instead of when she moved, I disengaged with her without disengaging her. Luna whined, sat a lot, got stuck a lot. The worst of it is not on video because I hadn't pressed record that time. We got 2 steps sometimes, 3 steps sometimes.

Lessons learned; FOCUS! Click for movement, not for stopping. Start with one step, when that's good, move to two. Then three. Don't start waiting for two! And forget about the camera.



For Lynn; these are the 'nesting cups':

Nesting cups & back up.

Homework for our next visit to the dog school; nesting cups and backing up. We started this morning.

Well, nesting cups was easy-peasy. There are 9 cups in my set, and Luna could nest 7 of them. The last two were too small to hold in such a way that she could aim well, although I might try them next time.

So, we moved on to backing up. I sat on the floor and paid close attention to her back legs. If either moved a tiny bit backwards, C/T. I placed the treat on the ground in front of me so she'd come forward to eat it. By the end of the session she could take 2 steps! We'll need to take it slow to make sure she's going straight and not trying to 'target' objects with her hips, but she was definitely getting it! Also, the noise level was very low. Does that mean we're both starting to understand this shaping thing? :D