20 Months: Training - November 11th - 15th, 2013

Can I help you?

Monday

Though a holiday for Emma, Jack's owner Ronda had to work and thus we start our day with Jack arriving at just before 8 AM.  Jack is happy to come to my home and loves to spend the day with me.  I decided a while ago Monday's are paperwork days and this one is no different.  I had two callbacks to make, a phone call to a friend to catch up on news and computer work to do.  Jack enjoyed a quiet day with breaks including hugs and kisses on his nose.  He was happy and relaxed when Ronda picked him up.


Tuesday

Are you sure I can't help you?

I have been asking Jack to help when he can around the house to proof some of his behaviors.  He's gotten better at picking up something when I ask, but not everything is within his grasp.  If he or Emma can't seem to pick up an item I call in my Go To Guy Max and ask for his assistance.  This time I had Jack, Emma and Max help with picking up the house.  He did great.  He even picked up an envelope when I asked.

I need to get Emma's retrieve cue for her handler attached and decided it was time to build more impulse control for Jack.  Jack wants to be in the middle of everything I do and I need space to work Emma.  Too many dogs in her space and she bails and goes to relax behind my recliner.

I pulled out a mat for Jack and Max and tethered Malcolm.  I tossed treats at Jack as I worked with Emma.  Jack had a hard time with staying on the mat, though Max had the concept down pat.  He waited for the treats to land between his feet and didn't move during the lesson.  Jack on the other hand got up and laid next to Emma and poked me.  I ignored him and tossed treats to Malcolm and Max.

It took him a bit to realize the only way to get me to recognize he existed was if he was on the mat.  He would walk to it and a treat would land and return to me.  Fine, nothing said, just ignore him until he was were I wanted him.  It took two lessons, but he started staying on the mat.

We worked on impulse control, because without Jack can't think.  The more I work different areas of impulse control the more Jack learns the basic lessons I need him too.  These lessons are translating into his public work.

I had an errand to run to the store and chose to take Jack with me.  I suited him up in Max's old harness and went to Walmart.  Though a bit nervous when we started and a bit out of control with his nose, with a clear guideline on what I wanted (rewards for looking to me on cued leave its and asking for him to sit/stay when picking out garlic or cat liter) he began to settle into working with me.

By the time we were headed to the front of the store he had moved from looking all over the place to work mode.  He had his head at shoulder level, a happy smile on his face and was prancing in harness.  His tail was up, he was breathing normal and was doing very hard work on keeping his nose to himself.  He was exhausted when we left and we'd only spent ten minutes working on proper service dog behavior in the store.

I gave him the rest of the day off so he could process the event.  I intended to take him back, but later in the week didn't work out that way for me.

Wednesday

I just want to help.....

Jack's mood improved from last week.  Last week Jack was worried and stressed and needed a lot of reassurance.  This week Jack was back to being the quiet, but confident Jack I am used too.  He's in the final minor fear stages of growing into a full blown adult dog and is very sensitive.  He has, from the beginning, alerted to Ronda's pain levels before they registered with Ronda by putting his head in her lap.  He also has, from the beginning, put his chest in her lap to help give her pressure to help ease the pain.  We had thought it was unique to Ronda, but he does it with me and he did it with my friend Shari when he first met her.  He leans in and just says, "I get it" when he senses someone is in pain.

He is also very sensitive to people's emotions.  When Ronda is upset or crying Jack gives even more comfort and wants nothing more than to make her burden easier.  He also senses when my moods are off, but his desire to comfort when mine are off is the opposite of what I need.  Max and Malcolm recognize I need space, Emma and Jack do not.

With the break I took at the end of last week to rebuild my balance, I am feeling much better and it shows in both Jack and Emma's moods.  They would not fair well living with me as my personnel dogs.  They are too sensitive and try to hard to "make up" to me if they sense I am out of sorts and that simple act of trying to "make up" to me is the same thing that makes my mood worse.  They are truly in the correct homes with their owners, whose personalities they better suit than mine.

To see Jack happy, with his head up and willing to play my games again was the reward I needed for taking the end of last week off and getting myself taken care of so I could provide for them the balance and security they need to feel safe.

We worked on Sit/Stay again and this time got up to 11 seconds with me 15 feet away.  Jack is slowly building his impulse control and I am happy to see it.  He's learning that Sit is what is paying and is not sliding into a down as often as he used too.  He is also not burning out on the lesson as fast as he did before.  With the lessons applied the day before in the store, he was more willing to work on them in the home.

We also worked on mat behaviors again.  The combination is improving his impulse control.  I brought in his mat from my van and set out a mat for Malcolm, Max and this time Dieter.  Dieter, who is happy to play mat games, joined us for the lesson while I worked with Emma.

This time Jack stayed on his mat more than off and even put his chin down while I worked with her.  It was a nice improvement from the day before.  I am going to spend about three days building mat behavior in one position in the kitchen and then change it up and move dogs to different landing zones to show it isn't the location, but the behavior I want.

Thursday

How about I babysit?

We worked on retrieves and mat behavior again as well as refreshing known behaviors.  Jack is improving on his retrieves, but hasn't figured out he can pick up his breakfast bowl in my house.  I will continue to work on it.

I do need to work on keeping up these blogs during the week and plan on scheduling about an hour a day to write up each day instead of trying to remember what we did for the week and writing them in a marathon run on Sundays.  By the time I get to the last blog update I am exhausted and brief.

Jack's mood was improved on Thursday and he was happy to see Walter when he arrived.  He is sedate with my company in the house and after a brief, but polite, hello he generally keeps his distance.  He was okay with the vacuum and steamer and would come to me if he felt a bit overwhelmed.

At the end of the day I had an interview and Walter watched the dogs.  He said all hell broke loose because Ronda walked in unannounced (I had forgotten to tell her Walter would be with the dogs, and she expected them to be crated) and it took a bit to calm all of the dogs down.

Ronda said Jack was overly excited and did a lot of jumping with the entire crew when she came in.  She was surprised to find them loose and Emma escaped the house and a great chase to get her back in needed to be done.  Emma had injured herself on Tuesday and was on restricted activity and wasn't supposed to run loose in the yard.  Bad trainer for not calling ahead and warning her the dogs were loose.

Friday

Fine, I'll just sit here and eat worms.

Jack has been taught to relieve on leash by Ronda and hasn't been practicing it at my home with me.  After Emma's injury and discovering her leash relieving skills were not as solid as they had been earlier this year.  That was my fault too.  I should have worked on them, but failed to do so.

I decided to work on Jack's since I am building them for Emma and Malcolm.  I took him out not less than six times and offered him the chance to go to the bathroom.  He never took the opportunity all day.  I knew he had to go, but he simply would not leave my side to pee.  Ronda told me later he got home and peed for a very long time right after getting out of the car - on lead, on cue.  So, Jack will go for her, but not me.

I will continue to work on this part of Jack's training.  He needs to learn how to go to the bathroom on cue for anyone, not just his owner.  If he can't, she'll have a hard time with him if she's ever hospitalized.  I do have to say he has remarkable bladder control.

I intended to take him out Friday, but my pain levels were through the roof and it felt like I was tearing tendons and muscles in my ankles.  I simply couldn't do it.  Instead we worked on mat behaviors while I introduced Emma to the idea she could take hold of her bowl and eventually retrieve it and hand it to me.

Jack is progressing, but slowly at this point.  He's at a point where slow and steady will build a more confident and capable dog than trying to hurry him through the process.  He's building nice impulse control and when Ronda picked him up he worked hard to keep his feet on the floor.  He's learning to put on a harness and not shy from it as it goes over his head.  He is also learning to put his feet along my ribs so I can snap the harness in place.  The pieces will fall together for him shortly and he'll be ready to work with her.

Next week we'll add more public access training and start applying what he knows to real life situations.  Jack is now ready for more public access training and learning to focus and work in his job as a service dog.




Level 1

	Zen	Target	Come	Sit	Down
Step	Completed	Completed	2	Completed	Completed

Level 2

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	3	4	2	1	Completed
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	1	Completed	2	5	1
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Tricks	Communication
Step	1	4	Completed	1	4

Level 3

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	0	2	2	1	0
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	Completed	1	0	0
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Retrieve	Communication
Step	0	0	Completed	2	0

Level 4

	Zen	Come	Retrieve	Target	Relax
Step	0	0	5	0	0
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	Completed	0	0	0
	Handling	Communication
Step	Completed	0