Reworking the Weaves

Dog training is an art.  Dogs are variable, unique, and make their own decisions.  They are not a math problem that can simply be solved by doing all the exact same steps every time.  Often handlers get frustrated with their dogs because they don't behave or perform to their expectations.  An example of this is when a dog is learning the weave poles.  The weaves are very hard to master, but it can be done.  Along the way, however, there may be many items to work through.  Often people will get very excited, saying, "Did you see that? Fido totally just did the weave poles all on his own!"  The handler will then send Fido through the weave poles again and again, expecting him to do it perfectly every time from here on out.  When Fido skips a weave, or otherwise makes a mistake, the handler will become frustrated with the dog, wondering why he did it right before and is making mistakes now.  There are so many factors that affect a dog's performance at any given time.  That's why you work on minimizing these factors and proofing your dog  How you handle the mistakes, however, is really the focus of this post.

Getting mad at your dog over and over after he makes a mistake will only teach him that working with you is a negative experience.  Nobody likes to fail repeatedly and neither does your dog.  Instead, if your pup is having a hard time, you want to help them out and create that environment of success. 

The video below is an example of this concept.  This was filmed several months ago when Cheri was becoming pretty competent on the weaves but was still in the earlier stages of the learning process.  She had been doing the weaves more or less independently but would still have occasional issues.  Watch the video, then I'll discuss a little more below. 

(P.S. the sound in the video is terrible-even I can't understand what I was saying at the beginning...something about treats...it's not really relevant, so don't worry about that portion.)

So, as a quick recap, Cheri was doing the weaves and missed on of the last gaps.  I gave her a negative marker, started her over, and she missed it again.  At this point, I realized that the first miss was not just a fluke (that does happen sometimes) since she missed the exact same spot the second time through.  So, the third time I take her through, we slow down a hair, and I give her a deliberate hand signal when she gets to the problem spot, reminding her that she needs to come around that pole.  If you missed this, I would recommend watching it again.

Also, a few other points to notice:

• My negative marker was relatively unemotional (I could actually use some work here though).
• Once she did successfully complete the weaves, she got extra praise.
• I took her through one more time and she again successfully completed the weaves-this reinforces the positive pattern.
• If you watch closely, you can probably figure out one of the reasons why she missed the spots both times.
• It is interesting to also observe what Cheri does after the second time she misses the weaves and after the second negative marker I give her.  This behavior will be discussed in a post next week.