My First Human Training Session

So I'm also a babysitter at the moment (I prefer to be called Nanny McPhee, but Red - one of my little charges - said no). Anyway, Red picked up my clicker and started playing it, which got Ozzie's attention immediately. Rather than tell her the usual, "That's not a toy, put it down",  I explained what it was for and showed her how to use it.

She caught on pretty quick for a 11 year old human.

I also got a little lesson in generalization. We were working on "sit", which Ozzie already knows from his pre-me training. They were doing really well, until Red sat down with the exaggerated exhaustion only an adolescent can experience - Ozzie's little brain couldn't cope with it and he stood around looking confused. I got her back up, and we finished the lesson on a really good sit.

We expect our dogs to catch on so quick to what we see as simple behaviors. I've always been amazed at owners who complain about how slow their dogs are to learn something, and then complain the dog is "bad" when they won't do the something everywhere and anywhere, under any conditions. But seeing the confusion in Ozzie's face when his "trainer" was doing something different really reinforced this lesson for me. I explained it to Red, but I'm not sure she got it.

And that reinforced the lesson that sometimes it's hard for the owners to learn new stuff too...

Question of the day: How much generalization training is enough?


PS I also learned to keep the clicker in my pocket from now on, not on my key ring...