Ractive or Proactive?

[Jane, Guinness and Murphy]

Things have been a little "slow" in the Training Group, so I thought it might be good to go back to the article on the Most Common Training Mistakes that Karen shared with us a few months ago.  Here's one of my favorites...

You are reactive, not proactive...

Dog training is a lot like the beautiful martial art of Tai Chi, with equal parts physical and philosophical. It takes timing, technique, and stamina, as well as a devotion to understanding the canine mind. It is not a skill that can be learned by watching one half-hour television show or from reading a few books. It takes time.

As a result, many dog owners have not yet mastered the timing and insight needed to train as capably as they might like. Like someone playing chess for the first time, they react to their opponent’s moves instead of planning their own.

When you simply react to Fido’s misbehaviours, you lose the opportunity to teach. Instead, practice your technique; anticipate his reactions ahead of time, becoming more proactive in the process. For example, if trying to quell a barking issue, instead of waiting for the barks to start, catch Fido right before his brain says “bark,” and distract it into some other, more acceptable, behaviour. Know that whatever stimulus is causing the barking needs to be either eliminated or redefined as a “good thing” in the dog’s head. This takes experience and a proactive role on your part.

This one has been tough for me to learn.  Here are a few examples from my "life with Murphy".

-He is reactive in the car, especially when we're near our home.  If he sees another dog he goes crazy in the car...barking, lunging at the window.  I hated it, because it made me a nervous wreck when I was driving.  It's a little difficult to correct a behavior when you're driving a car, so we needed another alternative.  We needed to be proactive and PREVENT the behavior before it happened.  The solution for us was to build on his down/stay command.  Now whenever he is in the car he is in a down/stay...every single time.  We trained this on local roads where I could pull over and put him right back in the down/stay if he broke.  It took a few weeks, but now it works like a charm.

-Murph loves to barking at other dogs walking by the house and lunging at the door.  Again, I wasn't always right there to correct when it happened, so we needed another solution.  We needed to PREVENT the behavior before it happened.  The only way to do this consistently was to no longer allow him access to the foyer of the house where he could see out.  It's a wide open floor plan so that was a little difficult and took some time to train.  This is really still very much a work in progress, but we are seeing good improvement.  He can walk through the foyer, but he can't sit down or lie down near the door.  Every time he tried it, I verbally corrected and moved him....putting him in a down/stay in another room (but where he could still see me).  Because he could still "practice" this bad behavior if we aren't home, we now put a large gate right in front of the door when we leave.  He won't go near that door if the gate is there.

How about you....any examples that you can share?
 

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

This may not help for your situation, but JD has learned that if we are playing ball in the yard and he stops to bark at anyone or anything, the game ends and we go inside immediately. He really does seem to "get it". There are times when you can just see the wheels spinning in that big head..."There's that dog I hate passing the yard! Bark, or keep playing?" He almost always chooses the tennis ball now. 

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Good boy, JD.

[Pat and Traveler]

Jane, I'm always amazed at your way of recognizing a problem, then diving right in and working on it!

I don't have a training idea here, other than the fact that Trav would be distracted from barking by having a ball thrown for him.  Not too helpful, I know.  He will bark if there's someone at the door, or at his nemesis, skateboarders.  Other than that, he's sort of inconsistent.  Some people walking on the sidewalk will cause him to bark, others not.  He might decide to bark at somebody parking a car across the street--but not if they park on 'his' side of the street.  If he's outside barking and I say 'hey,' in a stern voice, he trots into the house, goes into his crate and stands there looking pathetic.  Sometimes when he's on the bed and sees something bark-worthy through the window, he seems to levitate off the bed, heading toward the window.  It's the strangest thing--he's standing on the bed one moment, appears not to bend his legs or move at all, then he's sailing through the air, landing in the same position on the floor. 

A trainer asked if Trav would rather have a toy or a treat as a reward, and I had to say I didn't know.  The idea is to hold a toy (ball) in one hand and a treat in the other, and see which one the dog chooses.  Trav chooses the ball first, for a sniff and a glance to see if I want to throw it, then eats the treat. 

Going to stop rambling now.  :)