Posted: Thu Oct 12, 2006 5:44 pm Post subject: Speak and Be Quiet ...
I'd welcome any thoughts on the best way to teach these two commands. Asha has only half responded to my efforts so far - I think she knows I'm struggling!
She's 14mths, so busy testing me all over the place, but I realy would like to get this cracked.
Any advice would be fab please???
Cally the Rookie, and Asha the Adolescent!
I have a book I use for guidance, clicker training made easy.
It has lots of commands. Basically for these two it says you should start by catching them barking and rewarding (or distracting them for be quiet then rewarding)
The book is otherwise great but these commands did not make sense. Why reward your dog for barking when you didnt ask it to?
Since basil doesnt actually bark to start with i didnt want to risk training these.
Perhaps go to a bookshop and take a snaky look?
Im sure someone else who's done this may be able to help more - bump!
Thanks for that - I've been using Dog Training for Dummies which has been great for basic stuff but I've struggled to make sense of what they suggest for these 2 commands - it sound similar to yours. I suspect it's about timing, but I can never tell when she's going to bark and can't be ready ALL the time!
Will have a look in the bookshops, but any other suggestions gratefully received too!
I taught Baxter to speak - I thought it was going t be really tricky but he picked it up in about 20 mins!
He doesn't bark a whole lot, so I had to really really get him excited and make out there was someone coming (the only time he really barks). The clicker really does make it easier as you can click, and put your word in very quickly when they do it - Baxter's command is 'Ruff'.
He's getting good at it now, but is sometimes still a bit unsure if I really mean that he can bark loud and just does a little 'air bark' and pulls a really cute face instead!
Can i ask since you've taught it have you found Baxter barks more (ie when not asked to!)
I'm asking because i've steered clear from trying to teach Basil but it could be useful for safety if i ever felt threatened or something.
Basil doesnt bark or growl at all, not even when he went in the kennel for a long noisy weekend! I have only heard him bark once or twice hwen he was about 9 weeks old and we bough him one of those gigle balls!
I'm a little worried he would use it to get my attention, for toilet breaks, walks etc. At the moment he can get his treat ball stuck under the couch and sits and waits (sometimes for ages ) for me to get it.
I was worried about that too, which is why I chickened out and left it so long to teach him!
No, he hasn't, his 'ruff' command means to bark a single time too, so it hasn't set him off. He still only barks a couple of times when someone comes to the door, which is all he's ever done!
The only thing making him bark more at the mo is the bloomin' fireworks
Posted: Fri Oct 13, 2006 4:37 pm Post subject: speak
Quote:
I have a book I use for guidance, clicker training made easy.
It has lots of commands. Basically for these two it says you should start by catching them barking and rewarding (or distracting them for be quiet then rewarding)
The book is otherwise great but these commands did not make sense. Why reward your dog for barking when you didnt ask it to?
It sounds as though your book did not properly explain the philosphy and principles of clicker training.
When you clicker train, you create the behaviour and then give it a name.
If the dog is familiar with clicker training he understands that a session has begun when you have your clicker and treats ready. He will then try hard to 'earn' the treats by working out what it is you are clicking.
Dogs that are clicker trained get very good at this very quickly. It should not mean that your dog will be barking all the time.
What you might need to do is to ‘engineer’ a situation in which the dog will bark in order to click the barking. You might need to get a friend to knock at the door, or get the dog excited with a game to achieve this.
Once you have taught the dog to earn treats by barking when you get out your clicker, you can give it a name - this is called a ‘cue’. Once the dog has learnt the cue word through you saying the word every time he barks. You will find that you will be able to say the word and he will automatically bark.
This is called putting the behaviour ‘on cue’. Scientists have discovered that putting a behaviour on cue, actually makes it less, rather than more, likely that the dog will exhibit this behaviour at other times.
To teach the quiet command, you need to click the gaps between the barks. When the dog will stop barking to earn the treat, then you can add the cue word for this too.
Karen Pryor's book - 'don't shoot the dog' is an excellent and very readable introduction to training dogs (and humans) using these principles
yeah sorry i was probably a bit vague in my post assuming that callyw was already familiar wuth clicker training.
I understand and Basil is well practiced about me shaping a behaviour etc my issue with the book in that instance is that it didnt give much guidance on how to engineer a bark to reward.
Since basil doesnt naturally bark at anything it proved very difficult.
Thats why i suggested it was worth callyw reading as if you can get the behaviour to cue it would work!
My concern with barking when i dont ask for the cue would probably only happen in clicker sessions, where he will often throw behaviours when i ask him to try again (when learning a new command)
The real problem i would have is getting him to bark in the first instance!
I'm not familiar with clicker training at all, but will happily give anything a try - I will gladly take any advice I can get, I'm SOO new to all of this!
Is Karen Pryor's book based on clicker training then? And, erm ... what exactly is a clicker?? Where can I get one from?
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) for me to get it.
