The Starting Point

The Behavior – PLACE: Place will mean stand in a straight line at my left hand side with your front feet opposite from the ball of my foot – that’s how I will measure if Wynn is stopping in the same place or if he is moving forward or backward. This position will put him slightly forward of traditional heel position but allows us to make eye contact easier. Wynn will probably never know about his foot/my foot, he’ll come up with some marker that means something to him, but that is how I will measure whether he is where I want him to be.

Cues - Planned verbal cue “Place” Planned physical cue my left hand palm open facing dog just slightly ahead of where his nose should end up.

Evaluate - What tools do we already have in toolbox? Took Wynn to the training building to get an idea on where he is in the training game. First I asked for some targeting behavior - touch my hand. He understood that target while he was facing me if I put my hand to his right or to his left and even if I put it slightly above his nose. (After a little thought he jumped up.) Then I practiced a little of walking at left heel and walking at right heel. He has a good concept of those movements.

The Plan - I decided to try to get him to target my hand at my left side to put him into “Place”. The first two attempts at getting Wynn to target my hand on my left into position were unsuccessful. Wynn would move his tush to his left and swing out to look into my face and to get closer to food being delivered from right hand. Rule #1, if it doesn’t work twice STOP! Do not continue - DO SOMETHING DIFFERENT! (NOTE: Wynn did get reinforced for those two attempts as he did touch my hand which is what I asked for, but the plan wouldn’t get me to my goal very quickly too much happening that I didn’t want.

Change Plan #1 – I moved us to the wall so that he couldn’t swing wide. Wynn promptly “sat”. Well Duh Pam, you have been teaching him to heel with sits by using walls and gates to model straight sits. Hmm, walking near walls means sit when you stop (smart Whippet).

Change Plan #2 – I brought 2 broad jump boards into the ring and made a little shoot. Put Wynn between the boards and me on the outside. A little better luck, about 50% success. Wynn not really sure what I was looking for but he was trying and he did guess right about 50% (When mom takes a step forward and says “place” move forward, stand there and eat cookie!)
Modification for next session – As I was writing above I’ve decided I don’t like us being on opposite sides of the boards. I will make the boards wide enough so that we can both walk between.

Additional errors I was making – I found it very difficult to not click during movement into place. For this behavior I think I need to be sure to click for the stop into position – mustn’t wait too long or he might not understand that it was the position that he gets clicked for and he’ll think I’m clicking for stays. Timing will be critical.

Dangers I will need to be on guard for – It will be my habit to accept “close enough” instead of small progressions to exactly right.

The Behavior – Front: The finished behavior will have the dog standing straight in front, close enough that I can touch his head and far enough back that he can see my face.

Cue - Planned verbal cue – “Front”. I am struggling with a planned physical cue. If I put my hands in front of my body for targets I will have to go through the fading process, doable but an additional step. Or I can keep my hands at my sides and move backwards as my initial cue, but then I have to fade the backward steps. My weakness will be if I use a hand target here I will be tempted to not fade it properly. This will cause a problem if my hands need to be somewhere else (which they should be). I’m going to ponder this one a little more.

The Plan – since the boards were already out I had Wynn follow me while I backed up between and click for standing still when I stopped.

The result – well it worked in that Wynn followed, I stopped, he stopped, I clicked, he ate. But there was no comprehension of the position front only the come front and stop before your crash. I need to analyze this a little more.